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The US just froze more than $130 million in crypto. Not a rumor. Confirmed.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent went public with the move, saying the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control — OFAC — sanctioned several crypto wallets directly tied to the Central Bank of Iran. The goal, per Bessent, was to “deny the Iranian regime access to the proceeds of its illicit revenue schemes.” Hard words. And they came with hard action.
Blockchain investigator Specter tracked the actual mechanics. Stablecoin issuer Tether froze four TRON wallets holding roughly $131 million in USDT. Those wallets weren’t sitting idle — they’d received funds pulled from payment service provider DTC Pay and crypto exchange Bitso before the freeze hit. OFAC-sanctioned entities are listed as the wallet owners, including Iran’s Central Bank and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, better known as the IRGC.
How the $131M Trail Got Traced
The TRON network has become a go-to rail for moving stablecoins across borders, and that’s basically what made these wallets traceable. Tether’s ability to freeze USDT on-chain — something stablecoin critics have flagged for years as a centralization risk — turned out to be exactly the enforcement lever US authorities needed here. Four wallets. One freeze. $131 million gone from Iran’s reach, at least on paper.
DTC Pay and Bitso were the off-ramps. Both platforms processed withdrawals that eventually landed in those TRON wallets. It’s unclear yet whether either company faces direct regulatory action, and the source didn’t specify. But their names are now attached to a Treasury enforcement action, which is probably not where either wanted to be.
The freeze didn’t happen in a vacuum. US-Iran relations had already been deteriorating fast after the collapse of a ceasefire. The US military reinstated its naval blockade of Iranian ports — a blockade that had previously run from April through June before being lifted, and has now come back. Alongside the blockade, US forces carried out strikes on Iranian targets. Iran’s military hit back, launching drone attacks on Jordan’s Al-Azraq base, targeting facilities used by F-18 fighter jets.
So the crypto freeze and the military escalation are running on parallel tracks at the same time. That’s the context.
April’s $344M Freeze and the Nobitex Sanctions
It’s worth backing up a bit. April was already a big month for OFAC enforcement against Iranian crypto. Tether froze over $344 million in USDT that month, again at the request of US authorities. And Treasury didn’t stop at wallets — it went after exchanges directly.
Nobitex, Iran’s largest crypto exchange, got sanctioned. So did Wallex, Bitpin, and Ramzinex. All four were accused of helping Iran dodge sanctions and of running transactions tied to the IRGC. Nobitex drew the sharpest scrutiny. Authorities said it handled more than half of Iran’s crypto inflows in 2025 and helped the Central Bank of Iran get access to meaningful amounts of stablecoins. That’s a pretty significant role for a single platform.
The broader US campaign targeting Iranian financial networks has been labeled “Economic Fury” — and the name fits. Crypto exchanges, stablecoin wallets, TRON addresses — nothing’s been off-limits.
Stablecoin adoption across emerging markets has grown sharply in recent years, and Iran is no exception. Dollar-denominated stablecoins like USDT offer a way to hold value outside a collapsing local currency, and for sanctioned entities, they’ve offered something else: a path around the traditional banking system. That path is getting narrower.
Tether’s freeze capability sits at the center of all of this. Every time OFAC asks Tether to act, Tether can comply almost instantly — no court order, no bank correspondent, no waiting. It’s fast and it’s blunt. For sanctions enforcement, that’s useful. For anyone who thought stablecoins were censorship-resistant, it’s a reminder that they’re not, at least not when the issuer is a US-adjacent company under regulatory pressure.
Former President Donald Trump has warned of further US actions, including potential strikes on bridges and power plants, if Iran doesn’t re-engage in negotiations. That threat sits in the background of every financial move being made right now.
The naval blockade is back. The airstrikes are ongoing. Iran’s drones hit Jordan. And OFAC just pulled $131 million out of four TRON wallets.
Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin, and Ramzinex are all sanctioned. DTC Pay and Bitso had funds flow through them before the freeze. Tether executed the block. The wallets belong — per OFAC — to Iran’s Central Bank and the IRGC.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which crypto wallets did the US freeze in this action?
OFAC sanctioned four TRON wallets holding approximately $131 million in USDT, traced to Iran’s Central Bank and the IRGC, with Tether executing the freeze.
What Iranian crypto exchanges did the US sanction?
The US Treasury sanctioned Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin, and Ramzinex, accusing all four of facilitating sanction evasion and IRGC-linked transactions.
