The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office has slapped sanctions on Iranian financial facilitator Ali Ansari, the banker of Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, after Iran resumed attacking international ships in the Strait of Hormuz.
The Treasury Department said that Ansari has embezzled from the Iranian regime, diverting publicly funded wealth into an overseas portfolio of real estate and commercial holdings to enrich himself, regime elites—including notable senior figures within the Supreme Leader’s Office—and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
OFAC also targeted key Iranian exchange houses that move billions of dollars annually on behalf of sanctioned Iranian banks, using layers of shell companies to obscure the regime’s illicit financial activity.
“The so-called Supreme Leader is hiding in seclusion while his regime crumbles,” said Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent. “Treasury will continue using every tool at its disposal to isolate him and other regime elites from the global financial system. We will preserve these assets for the Iranian people.”
Dubai-based Iranian national Ali Ansari embezzled from the Iranian regime and has amassed a global network of investment properties and financial holdings, according to the Treasury Department.
The Treasury Department also sanctioned Iranian exchange houses that move billions of dollars on behalf of sanctioned Iranian banks.
Using numerous shell companies and bank accounts across multiple jurisdictions, Ansari has accumulated millions of dollars’ worth of holdings under the Saint Kitts and Nevis-based Smart Global Limited, a holding company established in 2011 under the former name Ziba Leisure Limited.
As a result of today’s action, all property and interests in property of the designated or blocked persons described above that are in the United States or in the possession or control of U.S. persons are blocked and must be reported to OFAC. In addition, any entities that are owned, directly or indirectly, individually or in the aggregate, 50 percent or more by one or more blocked persons are also blocked. Unless authorized by a general or specific license issued by OFAC, or exempt, OFAC’s regulations generally prohibit all transactions by U.S. persons or within (or transiting) the United States that involve any property or interests in property of blocked persons.
Violations of U.S. sanctions may result in the imposition of civil or criminal penalties on U.S. and foreign persons. OFAC may impose civil penalties for sanctions violations on a strict liability basis.
OFAC’s Economic Sanctions Enforcement Guidelines provide more information regarding OFAC’s enforcement of U.S. economic sanctions. The prohibitions include the making of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services by, to, or for the benefit of any designated or blocked person, or the receipt of any contribution or provision of funds, goods, or services from any such person.
Furthermore, engaging in certain transactions involving the persons designated today may risk the imposition of secondary sanctions on participating foreign financial institutions. OFAC can prohibit or impose strict conditions on opening or maintaining, in the United States, a correspondent account or a payable-through account of a foreign financial institution that knowingly conducts or facilitates any significant transaction on behalf of a person who is designated pursuant to the relevant authority.
The goal of the sanctions is to change behavior.