{"id":120135,"date":"2026-05-18T21:23:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T21:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/120135\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T21:23:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T21:23:11","slug":"irans-building-a-bitcoin-empire-for-the-strait-of-hormuz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/120135\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran\u2019s Building a Bitcoin Empire for the Strait of Hormuz"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Iran\u2019s Iran\u2019s Building a Bitcoin Empire for the Strait of Hormuz – Moby THE GIST <\/p>\n

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Much to the frustration of the Trump Administration, Iran\u2019s using Bitcoin to build the kind of financial digital infrastructure never thought possible.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re calling it the “Hormuz Safe,” a Bitcoin-based \u201cmaritime insurance platform\u201d tied to ships passing through the contested Straight of Hormuz, a key energy corridor.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s some irony here, given President Trump in 2024 ran on a pro-crypto platform, only to have the country he launched a hot conflict with turn around and use it.<\/p>\n

WHAT HAPPENED <\/p>\n

Developed by Iran\u2019s Ministry of Economy in mid-May, the \u201cHormuz Safe\u201d is a clear step by Tehran to turn its military grip on the Strait of Hormuz into a legitimate-looking commercial operation.<\/p>\n

Still, Western insurance firms, SWIFT (the international banking rails), and the U.S. dollar are unavailable for Iran to collect their Hormuz payments because there\u2019s still no peace treaty between Iran the U.S.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how it works: After filing a mandatory “Vessel Information Declaration\u201d form, commercial shipping companies, cargo owners, and oil tankers will then go onto the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp\u2019s online platform (hope there\u2019s good WiFi!), detail their cargo, and then send the required Bitcoin to a specified wallet. If you\u2019ve ever done this on Coinbase, there\u2019s a terrifying moment when you think you’ve entered the wrong wallet address, even though you’re waiting for the money to show up. We can\u2019t imagine how tense the first few go-arounds will be. Once the transaction clears Bitcoin\u2019s blockchain, the vessel receives a cryptographically signed digital receipt, proof of coverage, and their way.<\/p>\n

Sounds easy enough, right?<\/p>\n

WHY IT MATTERS <\/p>\n

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Not quite. At some point the IRGC will have to withdraw this Bitcoin from a custodial exchange and swap it for an asset more stable and widely accepted. This has already happened via various crypto exchanges, as well as by directly freezing on-chain crypto stablecoins like USDT (Tether).<\/p>\n

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced in late April that the U.S. government coordinated the freezing of $344 million in USDT tied to Iranian sanctions as part of “Operation Economic Fury.\u201d Bessent later said that the figure was actually higher, somewhere around $500 million. But this is only possible because the federal government and Tether are close, likely because Tether is in the process of launching USA\u20ae (USAT), a stablecoin designed specifically for the American market.<\/p>\n

Bitcoin, unlike USDT, can\u2019t be frozen because of its design. Bitcoin is entirely decentralized, meaning there\u2019s no corporate off-switch like Tether. Of course, the federal government can blacklist wallets, which would make it impossible withdraw from certain crypto exchanges. But Iran could then go to China, Russia, North Korea, or other U.S. adversaries. While the cryptocurrency is transparent and can be tracked, we saw last week that China told its companies to ignore U.S. sanctions targeting domestic refineries involved in the Iranian oil trade.<\/p>\n

So, who\u2019s going to tell them otherwise? Iran could also simply hold the Bitcoin, which would be great for Bitcoin given the recent scarcity narratives touted by crypto bulls like Michael Saylor.<\/p>\n

WHAT\u2019S NEXT <\/p>\n

General reporting on how the \u201cHormuz Safe\u201d works is still spotty, with most of the information coming from Iranian state-linked and regional Middle Eastern media outlets like the Fars News Agency.<\/p>\n

Worse, there is no verified public website or active portal for “Hormuz Safe” that international shipping lines can log into, leaving the potential for scam Bitcoin and crypto sites acting as the \u201cHormuz Safe\u201d a very real possibility. This already happened in late April, when one stranded ship fell for the scam, paid the crypto fee, and believed it had official clearance from Tehran to exit the Gulf, only to have its boat eventually shot at by the IRGC.<\/p>\n

That shouldn\u2019t take away from the fact that, if the IRGC can pull off the “Hormuz Safe,\u201d they stand to make $10 billion annually, per reports. None of this infrastructure existed before the Trump Administration and Israel launched their attack on Iran. It could end up hurting the U.S. dollar\u2019s supremacy \u2014 and throw a wrench into global trade.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Iran\u2019s Building a Bitcoin Empire for the Strait of Hormuz – Moby THE GIST Our analysts just identified…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":120136,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[28],"tags":[41040,102,40762,34,4125,722,2288,101,15862,23512],"class_list":["post-120135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-strait-of-hormuz","tag-digital-infrastructure","tag-hormuz","tag-hormuz-safe","tag-iran","tag-iranian-revolutionary-guard","tag-president-trump","tag-scott-bessent","tag-strait-of-hormuz","tag-the-trump-administration","tag-usdt"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116597686623316448","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/120136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}