Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic has reported that the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) purchased about $507 million worth of Tether’s USDT
According to Elliptic’s report, the CBI began collecting USDT during a time of economic instability.
The report stated, “The CBI’s accumulation of USDT began in earnest during a period of extreme economic volatility”.
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Over an eight-month period, the rial’s worth dropped by half compared to the US dollar. To slow this decline, the bank may have started using its Tether holdings to buy back rials on the Iranian crypto exchange Nobitex.
Elliptic’s data shows that the Iranian central bank likely used Nobitex, one of the country’s largest crypto exchanges, to handle its USDT transactions.
The partnership continued until June 2025, when Nobitex experienced a security breach.
After that, the CBI changed its approach before exchanging them for other assets and shifting them across several blockchains and trading platforms. They transferred their stablecoins “to a cross-chain bridge service to move the funds from TRON
The report also noted that Tether can freeze wallets holding USDT. Elliptic cited an incident from June 2025 when “several wallets linked to the CBI were blacklisted”, which froze around $37 million worth of stablecoins.
Recently, a Chainalysis report showed that Iran’s cryptocurrency activity reached about $7.8 billion in 2025. How? Read the full story.
