The US Just Confirmed How Much Bitcoin Iran Is Sitting On

From Yesterday's Simply Bitcoin Live | Episode 1595

The Numbers

Price is sitting right at the corporate treasury cost basis near $80,000, with the ETF cost basis at $85,000 next.

The News

The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Bitbank, an Iranian Bitcoin exchange controlled by financier Babak Zanjani, along with its software developer Pishtaz Simorgh Electronic Trade Company and three of Zanjani's associates. The move falls under Operation Economic Outcast, the campaign Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent runs to cut off the Iranian regime's money. Bessent's line on the sanctions: "If you support the Iranian regime, the Department of the Treasury will sanction you."

Treasury said Zanjani used Bitbank between June and July to move hundreds of millions of dollars in Bitcoin to the IRGC. That's the same window the already-sanctioned Hormuz Safe Marine Services Authority started routing ship payments through the exchange for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz. The sanctions killed the exchange. They didn't touch the Bitcoin already sitting in Iranian wallets.

Treasury can shut down a choke point. It cannot claw back a stack that's already in cold storage.

The Fed hiked rates for the first time since 2023, taking the target range to 3.75 to 4 percent. The Bank of Japan hiked 25 basis points two days later. The Clarity Act died in the Senate on a 49 to 50 cloture vote. Oil is trading above $100 a barrel and the dollar index cleared 100 for the first time in weeks. Bitcoin is up 8 percent in three days anyway.

Glassnode flagged that Bitcoin reclaimed its true market mean this week, putting price back in a bullish regime with the corporate treasury cost basis near $80,000 as the next level and the ETF cost basis at $85,000 after that. The 50-day moving average also crossed above the 200-day on both the Bitcoin dollar chart and the Bitcoin gold chart, a golden cross on both at the same time.

Bad news used to move this market. This week it didn't even try.

The Culture

On-Ramp founder and CEO Michael Tanguma joined the show to talk macro. His read on bond holders leaving fixed income: most individuals rotate into gold or private equity first, not Bitcoin. Sovereigns are a different story, caught in currency carry trades that eventually force a sale somewhere down the chain.

Tanguma's bigger point was about who actually understands this asset. Individuals, he argued, are still Bitcoin's most sophisticated holders because they've survived Mt. Gox, Celsius, and every blowup in between, while institutions still answer to a board before they can act. He called Bitcoin gold with wings: easier for a sovereign to move than a container of bullion.

Institutions showing up late to Bitcoin isn't the warning sign. It's the scoreboard.