On 7 August 2026, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated two crypto exchanges, Shelbit Exchange and Aban Tether, together with their operator Siavash Kayvanpour and a network of four affiliated front companies spanning Georgia, Poland and the UAE. The allegation: helping Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) move money through the crypto system.

It is the latest in a steady drumbeat of enforcement action, following the June 2026 designation of Iran’s largest domestic exchanges, Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin and Ramzinex. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was characteristically blunt about the direction of travel, saying the designation showed that “the Iranian regime’s reliance…