Federal prosecutors in Manhattan have moved to seize roughly $61 million in cryptocurrency tied to what they describe as an elaborate scheme to sell sanctioned Iranian crude oil on the black market and funnel the proceeds to the Government of Iran. The funds were allegedly intended to finance Iran’s military, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (“IRGC”), which was designated in the United States as a terrorist organization. According to the civil forfeiture complaint filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York on September 14, 2026, two China-based firms — Blessed Trust and Hexa Whale — operated as key intermediaries in the alleged laundering operation, converting illicit oil revenue into digital currency through trading accounts on the cryptocurrency exchange Binance. Prosecutors allege that a web of cryptocurrency wallets linked to the scheme channeled more than $1.5 billion in Iranian oil money to IRGC-affiliated financial networks and an Iranian crypto exchange.
Although Blessed Trust holds itself out as a wealth management and virtual-asset custody firm, prosecutors allege it actually received and moved the proceeds of Iranian petroleum sales — including by using U.S.-based cryptocurrency issuers to convert fiat currency into digital tokens. Hexa Whale, which publicly presents itself as a commodities brokerage, allegedly performed similar functions in coordination with Blessed Trust and its affiliates, with both firms serving clients in China’s petroleum sector. Prosecutors further assert that the two companies routed tens of millions of dollars through the American financial system as part of the broader effort, using layered transactions and deliberately opaque crypto addresses to disguise the origins and ownership of the funds.
USAO SDNY Press Release | Verified Complaint for Forfeiture