CoinEx denied claims that it served as a $3.84 billion gateway to sanctioned Iranian crypto firms. TRM Labs traced more than $3.84 billion in flows between CoinEx and sanctioned Iranian entities over the past seven years, and found CoinEx to be the single biggest trading partner of Nobitex, accounting for roughly $2.7 billion of those flows. CoinEx said it had no commercial relationships with Iranian government-related entities or domestic exchanges and that it began a review and exit process from Iran-related exposure after U.S. sanctions of Iranian exchanges.
TRM Labs traced more than $3.84 billion in flows between CoinEx and sanctioned Iranian entities over the last seven years. The analysis found CoinEx became the single biggest trading partner of Nobitex, accounting for around $2.7 billion of those flows. TRM Labs reported that CoinEx had direct transaction exposure with more than 60 Iranian crypto platforms. The tracing covered on-chain activity across the seven-year period described in the article.
TRM Labs identified exposure that included $6 million in transactions involving wallets linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and $374,000 tied to Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The article notes that the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Iranian crypto exchanges including Nobitex, Wallex, Bitpin, and Ramzinex. The TRM Labs findings and the listed U.S. Treasury sanctions are presented together in the reporting.
This section summarizes the TRM Labs findings and the U.S. Treasury sanctions noted in the article. It presents the stated exposure figures without analysis or direct quotations.
CoinEx denied that it ever established commercial relationships with Iranian government-related entities or Iranian domestic exchanges, and said it did not provide any form of active assistance to sanctioned parties. The company disputed TRM Labs’ findings linking large on-chain flows to its platform. After the U.S. Treasury sanctioned Iranian exchanges, CoinEx stated that it began a review and exit process to address all Iran-related exposure.
CoinEx cautioned that blockchain transactions are open, cross-platform and traceable, and that the movement of funds through a platform on-chain does not demonstrate that the platform was aware of, supported, or participated in the underlying activity. The company also noted that data from different third-party blockchain analytics platforms varies significantly and should not be treated as definitive. CoinEx said these points underpin its challenge to the tracing-based findings and its decision to review and exit Iran-related exposure.
This article presented TRM Labs’ findings alongside CoinEx’s denial, showing both the tracing-based exposure figures reported and the exchange’s rejection of those characterizations. The reporting noted the complexities and uncertainties involved in interpreting open, on-chain blockchain data and the variability of third-party blockchain analytics. CoinEx has said it initiated a review and exit process for its Iran-related exposure following the U.S. sanctioning of Iranian exchanges.
