The Iranian government's decision to accept cryptocurrency payments from ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz is a logical extension of its existing efforts to circumvent sanctions, according to experts in blockchain-based criminal activity. This development follows recent comments from a spokesperson for Iran's Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Products Exporters' Union, confirming that bitcoin is being accepted as a payment method, with reports suggesting that stablecoins are also being used to allow select oil tankers to pass through the strait unharmed, with a fee of $1 per barrel of oil. The formalization of a system for shipping toll payments using bitcoin and USD-pegged stablecoins appears to be a bold move, yet it aligns with the Iranian regime's, and specifically the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' (IRGC), increasing use of cryptocurrency over the past few years to facilitate international trade, particularly in oil sales, as per data from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis. Andrew Fierman, head of national security intelligence at Chainalysis, noted that it is unsurprising to see this type of trade happening via cryptocurrency, given the tolls paid by ships sailing through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical sea channel through which approximately a fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas passes.
A review of sanctioned activities over the last year and a half reveals a complex and expanding network utilizing crypto wallets. In December 2024, a US-sanctioned, IRGC-affiliated financier linked to the Iran-backed Houthi regime facilitated Iranian oil sales to Yemen involving cryptocurrency addresses, resulting in over $178 million in transfers within a year. Then, in April 2025, a broader network of Houthi financiers purchased weapons and commodities from Russia, with their cryptocurrency addresses included in a sanctions designation accounting for nearly a billion dollars in activity over the course of a year.
The Houthis, an Iran-backed armed group controlling much of northern Yemen, have also raised the prospect of imposing a second chokepoint on the world's oil and gas shipping trade at the Bab-al-Mandeb channel connecting the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden. According to Fierman, the picture that emerges is one of IRGC-affiliated networks using crypto at a commercial scale to facilitate cross-border trade, a system more complex and established than the simple use of a handful of wallets. The IRGC has a network of cryptocurrency wallets that the regime uses to facilitate this cross-border activity, making it easier to accept these payments in crypto than through the traditional banking system, and with sufficient liquidity, they do not even need to use cryptocurrency exchanges. The broad adoption of cryptocurrency, especially stablecoins, as a payment mechanism for cross-border trade by the IRGC is the inverse of North Korea's situation, where the primary goal is to steal and launder billions of dollars in crypto.
The Iranian regime has faced comprehensive sanctions since 1979, including individual sanctions on almost every bank, making it challenging for them to access US dollar-pegged assets and trade internationally. The ability to obtain a US dollar-pegged asset creates a mechanism that allows them to trade globally with anyone willing to trade with them, using an alternative mechanism that does not rely on the traditional banking system. Tom Keatinge, founding director of the Centre for Finance and Security at UK defence think tank RUSI, agreed that USD-backed stablecoins have become an increasingly important payment mechanism for the Iranian regime, allowing them to avoid sanctions and western banking controls. Lee Reiners, a lecturing fellow at Duke University's Financial Economics Center, suggested that the Iranian regime could further its sanctions-skirting stablecoin goals by demanding payment in USD1, a stablecoin launched by the Trump family-affiliated World Liberty Financial in March 2025, which could create a financial incentive for the US to lift sanctions.