https://arab.news/wf8ze
- Iranian banks use domestic and foreign companies to trade in goods and currencies, easing pressure on Iran’s ailing economy
- Officials in Iran say annual clandestine trade is worth $80 billion a year
LONDON: Iran has established a clandestine banking and finance system that allows it to handle billions of dollars and evade US-imposed sanctions, according to intelligence officials and documents seen by the Wall Street Journal.
The Islamic Republic uses a system of foreign commercial banks, proxy companies cooperative firms and a transaction clearing house within the country to move money and withstand sanctions.
According to documents seen by the WSJ and officials they have spoken with, Iran’s clandestine banking system works as follows: Iranian banks that serve companies barred by US sanctions from exporting or importing engage affiliate firms — “Rahbar” companies — in Iran to manage sanctioned trade on their behalf. Those firms establish companies outside of Iran’s borders to serve as proxies for the Iranian traders.
The proxies then trade with foreign purchasers of Iranian oil and other commodities, or sellers of goods for import into Iran, in dollars, euros or other foreign currencies, through accounts set up in foreign banks.
Some of that revenue is smuggled into Iran by couriers who carry cash withdrawn from the proxy company accounts abroad, officials told the WSJ, but much of it remains in bank accounts abroad. The Iranian importers and exporters use it to trade foreign currency among themselves, on ledgers maintained in Iran, according to the Iranian central bank.
These methods are used to facilitate the sale of Iranian oil and other goods and also the purchase and import of goods needed within Iran.
The system provides Iran the revenues and imports it needs to keep the economy and country running. It eases the pressure on the Iranian rial by giving the economy access to the dollars, euros and other reserve currencies in which world trade is denominated, according to diplomats and officials.
One Western official told the WSJ: “This is an unprecedented governmental money-laundering operation.”
According to Gholamreza Mesbahi-Moghaddam, a senior Iranian political figure, covert import and export transactions amount to $80 billion a year.
“The majority of our exports of gasoline, steel, petrochemicals — all are under hidden subsidiary activities,” he said.
The International Monetary Fund estimates that the figure will grow to $150 billion in 2022 including foreign sales that are banned under the sanctions, more than twice the levels during the brief period when Iran was freed from sanctions.
In this way, it appears, Iran has managed to evade sanctions, even managing to boost its trade to roughly pre-sanctions levels.
While the value of the rial has plummeted during the years of sanctions, the Iranian economy has withstood international isolation enough to allow Iran to conduct tough negotiations with the US over the future of its nuclear program.
Iran’s mission to the UN did not respond to a WSJ request for comment about the finance system.