Iran cheerfully admits using cryptocurrency to pay for imports

Iran has announced it used cryptocurrency to pay for imports, raising the prospect that the nation is using digital assets to evade sanctions. Trade minister Alireza Peyman Pak revealed the transaction with the tweet below, which translates as "This week, the first official import order was successfully placed with …

[DS999]

That also makes the payments traceable

And perhaps hackable, or definitely stealable by insiders who later flee the country. I predict this is not the last we hear of this, and the next story mentioning Iran buying goods with crypto will provide a cautionary tale.

[iron]

Re: That also makes the payments traceable

Until they pick & mix with Tornado Cash or another mixer to wash those cryptobucks whiter than white!

[DS999]

Re: That also makes the payments traceable

The US government has already demonstrated their ability to track crypto through mixers.

[amanfromMars 1]

A Rigged Market

Simon, Hi,

Long before the advent of cryptocurrency, all of the woes for which it is now cited as encouraging .... speculative trading, making the ransomware industry possible, and helping authoritarian states like Iran and North Korea to acquire materiel for weapons. ..... was the exclusive preserve of fiat currency and there was never any great fuss about that, was there?

So what does that tell all of us?

[DS999]

Re: A Rigged Market

Its getting close to sentience, we're all doomed!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: A Rigged Market

Replaced with yet another orc loving troll.

[hammarbtyp]

Re: A Rigged Market

Well...

a) there was a fuss, which is why extensive banking regulation was brought in to control and monitor such transfers

b) The reason bad actors moved to cryptocurrency was because the regulation worked

[amanfromMars 1]

Re: A Rigged Market

Oh please, you cannot be serious. Who on earth told you those dodgy myths have been and are working well, hammarbytp?

File them alongside the one about the arbitrary punitive raising of interest rates the Governor of the Bank of England is routinely obliged to insist is effective in controlling and defeating inflation rather than creating more profit for banking systems in the throes of existential collapse and investor exhaustion.

Have a well deserved downvote for that rampant misinformation which is so despicably misleading and counter-productive.

[hammarbtyp]

Re: A Rigged Market

see b)

[Dave314159ggggdffsdds]

Re: A Rigged Market

Ah, here he is. One mention of money, and out they come, crawling from the woodwork, to explain the conspiracies.

[amanfromMars 1]

Re: A Rigged Market

Ah, here he is. One mention of money, and out they come, crawling from the woodwork, to explain the conspiracies. .... Dave314159ggggdffsdds

Please accept my apologies for making it impossible to viably deny the honesty of the observations, Dave314159ggggdffsdds.

However, playing the man and not the ball is not cricket, old bean.

And money is the gift which just keeps on giving .... with the love of money being the root of all evil being believed by numerous sources ...... so it is bound to have its covetous zealot and passionate fan bases.

[Dave314159ggggdffsdds]

Re: A Rigged Market

Yes, yes, we get it, Corbyn is god, there were swimming pools at the holiday camp, Henry Ford had the right idea, and so-on down the rabbit hole.

[JimmyPage]

Sounds like they are pissing in the pond

I forsee a flood of emails from Iranian ministers holding vast amounts of cryptocurrency that just need your bank details ..

[simonb_london]

I can see where this is going... "We must ban non-state-owned crypto and all sacrifice any notion of privacy and anonymity so that countries like Iran don't have any either".

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a letter from the treasury stating their policy towards crypto is that the majority of transactions are for legitimate purposes, therefore they have no plans to intervene in the market.

This is, of course, tosh. From an inept government that has totally forgotten the priorities on which it survives.

Boris actively doing nothing while energy prices balloon - is just yet another example that they really do not give a hoot as long as their rich mates are propped up.

#generalelectionnow

[Spazturtle]

"Boris actively doing nothing while energy prices balloon"

There is nothing that can be done to bring down energy prices in the short term as the price rise is caused by a shortage, there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid each other for it.

[Jedit]

"there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid"

This is not accurate. The generation cost per kWh is lower now than it was six months ago.

And no, the government can do something short term. It's called price capping. France has done it, which is why French energy prices have only risen by a few percent instead of tripling - and also why EDF are gouging customers in countries like ours where the government puts business profits ahead of the lives of its citizens. If you think that energy companies can generate record profits while their customers have to choose between buying food and being able to cook it and nothing can be done about that, then you are an idiot.

And thanks for the free heating, but it's actually quite warm right now so I don't need it.

[Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells]

Re: "there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid"

France has had to give a *massive* subsidy to EDF in order to keep it from going bankrupt from the price cap.

If you want the government to give the energy companies massive cheques then why not say so?

Although I think you're just hoping that people won't think too hard about what normally happens when you set a price cap below the price of production.

Also those record profits - I assume you're talking about BP which made a decent profit in Q2 but made a far bigger loss in Q1. Are you lying there, or are you just misinformed?

[Cuddles]

Re: "there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid"

"France has had to give a *massive* subsidy to EDF in order to keep it from going bankrupt from the price cap.

If you want the government to give the energy companies massive cheques then why not say so?"

That's exactly what they already are doing. Setting a higher price cap and then sending everyone a cheque with which to pay the bill is functionally identical to having a lower cap and giving the subsidy directly to the energy companies. The only difference is that the way they've chosen has a much higher bureaucratic overhead and more opportunity for fraud.

[Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells]

Re: "there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid"

No, the only difference is that when this is over, we won't have government owning an industry for it to run into the ground, whereas France will.

[Jedit]

"If you want the government to give the energy companies massive cheques then why not say so?"

Because that's not what I want. It should be painfully obvious to anyone that if a private company can't make a profit while charging what people can afford, then they've failed. And if what they're selling is an essential service, then that service should not be in private hands. The cap and associated bailouts aren't an argument for government subsidy of private industry; they're an argument for nationalisation, which is also what is happening to EDF in France. And before anyone goes off about "lefty nonsense": the TUC has costed out privatisation of the Big Six at less than the cost of the bailout issued to cover Bulb.

Re: profits - I'm not talking about a single quarter for BP. It's all of them. BP did indeed suffer large losses in 2020, but their 2021 profits were an 8-year record and have only continued to increase in the first six months of 2022. Centrica made £262m profit in the first half of 2021; in the first half of 2022 they made £1.34bn. And Shell's profits are also surging to record levels, with Total's not far behind.

Sources:

https://www.itv.com/news/2022-07-28/british-gas-owner-centrica-profits-rise-to-134-billion-as-energy-bills-surge

https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/bp-records-highest-profit-eight-years-2021-2022-02-08/

https://www.ft.com/content/39cc3cb6-b054-438b-819d-e391c0701e44

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "there is not enough oil and gas to go around so people are having to outbid"

Seconded.

There is a case openly publicised right now of one of the Bankrupt energy supply companies where the administrators had to be called in. Said company happened to also be sat on a bunch of gas futures - which have increased in value massively.

The value has increased to such an extent that their sale has more than cleared the debt of the bankruptcy and the directors are walking off with tens-of-millions in their pockets.

In the meantime the standing charge has still gone up massively to "bail out" those bankruptcies.

Ofgem have completely and utterly failed to protect the consumer, between CfD and the implementation of how to deal with failed supply companies.

Calling out the failings of the incumbent government is essential to find ways to do something better. If the incumbents won't deal with it, then I can assure you, the average Brit earning £27k/year, will. Ignoring experts has been a hallmark of successively extreme Tory leadership and the chickens are now coming home to roost.

[Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells]

#thisisn'ttwitter #growthefuckup

[Anonymous Coward]

So you're OK with the nation-state criminal uses of Crypto?

Ineffectual government is ineffectual government. There are real world threats here causing lots of damage, and here you are backing a government that is actively choosing not to intervene in things that could reduce damage.

[Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells]

I refer you to my previous #comment.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, someone must be seriously invested in crypto and a tory to be so oblivious to the damage they are willfully supporting.

May your ponzi scheme rot to nothing and the charlatans that swiped it from you laugh all the way to the bank.

[Wellyboot]

The treasury are probably correct if they didn't mention any values.

Two BTC transactions for chai-latte (value £10) is twice as many transactions as one BTC transaction for weapon grade IR sensors (value £10m)

[iron]

Still think Tornado Cash is about free speech?

[sanmigueelbeer]

More popcorn please ...

I cannot wait `til news emerge that the NK hackers have emptied some crypto wallet owned by the Iranian Government.

[Anonymous Coward]

Good!

Economic sanctions have a disproportionate effect on the populace while doing next to nothing to achieve whatever ends the imposing party wants to achieve.

Let's also be clear about this: Iran is under mostly US or US sponsored sanctions following their change of government in 1978 which did not please uncle Sam. If it was bugger all to do with terrorism / child porn / Satanism / late return of library books / whatever they're accused of, Saudi Arabia for one would be on the same boat. Yet it isn't.

(I've worked in both KSA and Iran)

[Dave314159ggggdffsdds]

Re: Good!

Kremlin stooges lie. Who knew?

[crayon]

Not sure why this article is tagged with "LAW" since there is nothing lawful about unilateral sanctions. Only sanctions approved by the UN are valid under International Law. Unilateral sanctions - the vast majority of US sanctions - are deemed an Act of War under International Law. It is only because the US holds a very big stick and Iran only has a small twig that the latter has not declared war on the former. Thus validating that in international affairs, might means right.

[Dave314159ggggdffsdds]

Another lying Kremlin stooge. None of what you say is true. It is pure Kremlin propaganda.

Only the UN security council can implement UN sanctions, on behalf of the UN. Nothing in international law prevents unilateral sanctions; indeed, they are explicitly permitted.