The U.S. Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on eight Canadian money services firms that it alleges have facilitated transactions with sanctioned Iranian entities, including cryptocurrency exchanges linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The companies facilitate the exchange of Iranian rials and other currencies for digital assets to enable international transactions involving Iran, the Treasury Department said in a Nov. 6 press release.
“Canada cannot be a safe haven for illicit financial facilitators that provide sanctions evasion services to the Iranian regime and its proxies,” Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said in the press release. “Treasury will pursue and disrupt the Iranian regime’s financial channels anywhere in the world.”
The sanctions are part of Operation Economic Outcast, launched by the Treasury in August to disrupt the Iranian regime’s use of digital assets to “fund terrorism, human rights abuses, and attacks on U.S. personnel and allies,” the Treasury said.
“Canada is home to hundreds of money services businesses that enable the movement of funds into and out of Iran, both through cash-based value transfer systems and by converting cash into digital assets to send across borders.”
The Treasury had previously sanctioned a number of exchanges that have moved digital assets abroad on behalf of the Iranian regime, including Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin, and Ramzinex on June 2, and Aban Tether Exchange and SHPS Shelbit (Shelbit), which operates the Shelbit Exchange, on Aug. 7.
The sanctions announced Nov. 6 involve Ontario-based Diverse Trade Inc., doing business as Million Exchange; B.C.-based 1380079 BC Ltd. and Ontario-based Top PC Technician Inc., doing business as Amin Exchange; and B.C.-based NIA Nations Currency Ltd., operating as NIA Nations.
The other four designated money services businesses, all based in Ontario, are Darvish Exchange; 2397639 Ontario Ltd., doing business as Farah Exchange; and CCC Inc. and B Galaxy Inc., which operate in the same location, with the latter doing business as Cryptoyal.
The U.S. Treasury Department says these entities have allowed “sanctioned Iranian entities to use their services, thereby providing the Iranian regime with financial lifelines and the ability to continue to finance terrorism and proxy groups.”
“Many of these entities also receive and launder funds associated with other criminal activity,” the department added.
The Treasury alleges that many of these businesses have facilitated transactions with IRGC-linked digital asset addresses or with sanctioned Iranian digital asset exchanges. In particular, the department says Million Exchange, Amin Exchange, and Farah Exchange have worked with alleged Canadian drug trafficker Ryan Wedding to launder millions of dollars’ in drug proceeds. Wedding, a former Olympic snowboarder for Team Canada, was arrested in January and is in U.S. custody.
The department also noted that several of these firms have changed their business names and addresses in attempts to evade detection.
The sanctions mean that the designated companies’ assets under U.S. jurisdiction are frozen and must be reported to the Treasury Department. U.S. regulations generally prohibit all transactions by U.S. persons or within the United States that involve those entities. In addition, U.S. and foreign individuals and businesses that violate the sanctions may face civil or criminal penalties, including fines, according to the Treasury.
U.S. sanctions on Iran have been in place continuously since the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which led to the overthrow of the monarchy, a close U.S. ally, and establishment of the Islamic Republic.
Washington has expanded its sanctions on Tehran on various occasions since then to target Iran’s nuclear program, support for militant groups, ballistic missile development, and human rights abuses.
English (US) · 
Turkish (TR) · 