U.S. authorities have sanctioned four individuals and nine entities tied to Iranian financier Babak Morteza Zanjani, targeting key components of a global network allegedly used to evade sanctions and move funds for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated Zanjani’s sister, Bahareh Morteza Zanjani, an Iranian national residing in the United Arab Emirates. Treasury officials accused her of managing Dubai-based BZ Diamond FZCO, a dealer in lab-grown and natural diamonds that materially supported Zanjani’s U.K.-registered crypto platform, Zedxion Exchange Ltd.
An OCCRP investigation previously revealed that Zedxion functioned as a corporate front controlled by Zanjani behind a fictitious CEO.
"The Iranian regime continues to pay a steep economic price for its reckless behavior, with the rial plunging to another record low and inflation up massively," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.
The sanctions build on Washington's January 30 designation of Zanjani and his flagship crypto exchanges, Zedcex Exchange Ltd. and Zedxion. Zanjani was originally sentenced to death in Iran in 2016 for embezzling state oil funds before having his sentence commuted in 2024. By 2025, he had publicly re-emerged as an economic backer of Iranian regime projects.
OCCRP's reporting revealed that Zanjani’s crypto platforms claimed to have processed billions of dollars in digital assets on a daily basis while reporting to U.K. authorities that they were dormant.
TRM Labs, a blockchain analysis company, reported that the exchanges transferred more than $10 million to Sa’id Ahmad Muhammad al-Jamal, a senior financial official for Yemen’s Houthi militia.
OCCRP’s investigation published in February found that to conceal Zanjani’s control, the platforms presented a fictitious CEO under the name "Elizabeth Newman," portrayed in promotional materials using stock video footage of a hired model. U.K. corporate filings show that Zanjani himself had previously served as Zedxion’s listed controller under the name "Babak Morteza" until August 2022.
Following the revelations, Britain’s corporate registry, Companies House, initiated steps to forcibly dissolve Zedxion Exchange Ltd., citing “misleading, false, or deceptive” information in its incorporation records.
In its latest designation, OFAC also blacklisted Solmaz Bani, a Dutch national based in Dubai whom officials described as his “significant other.” OCCRP previously uncovered her operational ties through domain records and social media posts, including photos of a distinctive cat wearing a bright purple bell on its collar that appeared on both her personal account and Zedxion’s official Telegram channel.
OFAC said in its statement that Bani “registered websites for Zanjani’s companies” and that she was being sanctioned “for having materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or goods or services to or in support of, Zanjani.”
Zanjani responded to the new measures on his X account, saying “[t]he companies and individuals sanctioned by the United States outside of Iran have no commercial relationship with me, nor have they ever had one.”
Inside Iran, the Treasury targeted Zanjani’s Tehran-based "Dot One" conglomerate, an extensive network spanning infrastructure, aviation, and digital assets where Zanjani has served as chief executive since at least 2024.
OFAC designated primary holding company Dot One Value Creation Group alongside several subsidiaries, including DotOne Gold Company, which mints gold bars and acts as custodian for Tala Token, a digital asset that passed through Zedcex infrastructure in early 2025. Sanctions were also imposed on DotOne Rail Company — which secured an $800 million contract with Iranian state railways in April 2025 — as well as DotOne Airlines Company, DotOne Barter Company, and travel service DotOne Trip.
The U.S. government further blacklisted foreign entities providing financial and technical infrastructure to Zanjani’s exchanges. In Turkey, fintech provider Zedpay Finansal Sistem Ve Hizmetleri Anonim Sirketi and its chairperson, Mehdi Rezazadeh, were designated for integrating with Zedxion to provide digital wallet and cross-border payment capabilities. In the UAE, Dubai-based Zedx DMCC and its manager, Sukhrob Oimakhmadov, were sanctioned for managing exchange wallets on behalf of Zedcex.
The sanctions freeze all of the U.S.-based property and financial interests belonging to the designated individuals and entities, prohibit American citizens and institutions from transacting with them, and expose foreign entities to civil or criminal penalties for assisting the network.
Source: Original article