U.S. Treasury Sanctioned BitBank, the Exchange Behind Iran's Bitcoin Tolls on Hormuz Ships

The US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control designated BitBank on 17 September 2026 in a press release (sb0632). Decrypt (18 September 2026) and Blockonomi reported the same action.

This is an OFAC sanctions designation under Executive Order 13902, part of Operation Economic Outcast. It is a formal US blocking listing, not a criminal conviction, not a MiCA decision, and not an action against Japan's regulated bitbank, inc.

Treasury names BitBank as an Iranian digital assets exchange and a priority venture controlled by already designated financier Babak Zanjani. The same day it designated Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Company, which built BitBank's software as a subsidiary of Dot One, plus Hossein Ali Zaker Hossein, Mohammad Mahdi Zaker Hossein (Pishtaz Simorgh's CEO), and Seyed Adel Heidari.

Since June, Treasury says, the Hormuz Safe Marine Services Authority has used BitBank to transfer payments it collected on a shipping safe-passage Bitcoin scheme through the Strait of Hormuz to the Iranian regime. Between June and July, the release says, Zanjani utilized BitBank to facilitate the transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of Bitcoin to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. That dollar figure is Treasury's allegation, not an independently audited on-chain total in the coverage.

Operation Economic Outcast was announced by Secretary Scott Bessent on 24 August 2026. US property of the designated persons is blocked, entities they own 50 percent or more of are blocked, and counterparties face secondary-sanctions risk.

Blockonomi notes a prior July freeze of about $130 million in USDT in wallets tied to Iranian entities. That freeze is earlier action, not today's BitBank listing. Iranian media talk of a roughly $10 billion Hormuz-platform aspiration is not an OFAC confirmed collected amount.

Related Iran and crypto-rail tape includes Treasury's Golden Global Bank designation, the DOJ's $61 million USDT Iranian-oil forfeiture, and Treasury's 27 Iranian airline designations under Outcast.

Compliance, exchange, and shipping-finance desks should add BitBank, Pishtaz Simorgh, and the three named Zanjani associates to screening today, treat Hormuz Safe Bitcoin transit payments as a blocked-person corridor, and keep Japan's bitbank, inc. off that list.