OFAC Sanctions Eight Canadian Money Services Businesses Over Iran Crypto Flows

Eight Canadian Firms Under E.O. 13902

The US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned eight Canada-based money services businesses on November 6, alleging they converted Iranian rials and other currencies into virtual assets to move funds for the Iranian regime. The designations fall under Executive Order 13902 and form part of Operation Economic Outcast, the Iran-focused campaign Treasury launched in August. Treasury announced the package in a November 6 post on X. The eight firms are Diverse Trade Inc, 1380079 BC Ltd, Top PC Technician Inc, NIA Nations Currency Ltd, 2397639 Ontario Ltd, CCC Inc, B Galaxy Inc and Darvish Exchange, with 1380079 BC and Top PC Technician both operating under the Amin Exchange trade name. The notices also publish six addresses on Tron, a delegated proof of stake network, tied to four of the designated firms. Address data connects NIA Nations Currency to wallets linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and to Nobitex, an Iranian exchange already under US sanctions, while addresses associated with Amin Exchange received crypto from Shelbit, another sanctioned venue. Treasury further alleges that some of the firms laundered proceeds for Ryan Wedding, a former Olympic snowboarder already on the OFAC list: couriers allegedly brought cash from drug sales to the businesses, which converted the funds into crypto and moved them abroad. The step was coordinated with FinCEN, the Drug Enforcement Administration and Canada's FINTRAC. Property of the designated firms inside the United States, or in the possession or control of US persons, whether held on a trading platform or in a hardware wallet, is blocked, and entities 50 percent or more owned by a designated firm are sanctionable by extension. Treasury warned that violations can draw civil penalties on a strict liability basis. The same campaign produced a FinCEN order that effectively cuts MEXC Global, one of the larger crypto exchanges serving offshore clients, off from the US financial system, effective 30 days after publication in the Federal Register.

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SEC Staff Views and CFTC Fair Access

Federal regulators also moved on the rulebook side. The Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Corporation Finance added three questions to its digital asset disclosure guidance on November 2, sharpening how staff decide who controls a crypto network. Broad groups of governance participants are generally not treated as a single central party when they are unaffiliated and have not agreed to act together outside governance, but the assessment turns on actual relationships and control structures. Factors the staff says it weighs include the power to restrict network access, to select validator participants and to change voting procedures and code unilaterally; the guidance also separates a token's functionality from who holds operational, economic and voting power, and states expressly that the answers reflect staff views, are not Commission rules and create no new legal obligations. On November 3 the same division issued a no-action response for Canton Coin: on the facts and the legal opinion submitted, the token is treated as a digital commodity, and staff would not recommend an enforcement action over Securities Act registration provisions if super validators, validators and application providers issue it according to its program. The relief is conditional and does not extend to other tokens. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) followed on November 5 with an interpretation of designated contract markets' duty to offer fair and equitable access under the Commodity Exchange Act. Geographic restrictions inside the United States that breach that duty must be discontinued within 30 days, or the market must explain to the Division of Market Oversight why compliance is impracticable; intermediaries that block access also fall within review, with outcomes decided case by case. A designated contract market is a derivatives venue registered with the CFTC, not every crypto exchange, and nothing in the interpretation makes every commodity tradable nationwide. Attorney Michael Handelsman reviewed the week's moves in a column posted on the Kelman PLLC site on November 8, which carries an attorney advertising notice. The Justice Department separately disclosed that former FBI agent Patrick Steven Yaroch pleaded guilty on November 5 to wire fraud and money laundering after using crypto credentials stored in FBI systems for about 100 unauthorized transfers connected to 35 investigations; sentencing is set for March 4, 2027.

Deadlines, Not Proposals

Read together, the actions aim at the conversion layer of the market rather than at any protocol. OFAC struck the cash-to-crypto businesses, FinCEN removed an exchange's route into US banking, and the SEC and CFTC set compliance clocks instead of floating proposals: 30 days for designated contract markets to close geographic gaps, and 30 days from Federal Register publication for the MEXC order to take effect. The SEC's guidance binds nobody, but it defines the record a decentralization claim must now survive, while the Canton Coin response shows the same framework grants relief when the underlying facts are formally filed. Firms on the receiving end face fixed dates rather than open-ended negotiation.