Iran Thinks It Can Outwit Trump. The Key? Bitcoin

As tensions mount between the United States Trump administration and the Iran regime, the rogue state has been working on a strategy to outwit the US President and get around his economic sanctions and political pressure – and it all relies heavily on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Is Iran Using Bitcoin to Outwit President Donald Trump?

While World War III may have thus far been averted, the tensions between the United States and Iran continue to increase and come to a boiling point.

Earlier this month, the US Trump administration completed a drone missile strike that claimed the life of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani.

Related Reading | FinCEN Issues Advisory On Iran’s “Illicit” Use of Crypto to Bypass Sanctions 

In retaliation, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps launched ballistic missile attacks at the Ayn al-Asad airbase in Iraq, killing American citizens. While Trump said the damage done was minimal, as many as 80 deaths were recorded of US citizens.

But the attacks are just the latest in an ongoing saga between the United States and Iran, dating back decades.

Even President George W. Bush had dubbed Iran as one of the three countries in the “axis of evil” nearly twenty years ago, and the turmoil dates back much further than that.

Among the ways that the United States Trump Administration applies pressure to these rogue states, is by enforcing economic sanctions.

According to data, the strategy has been working and has diminished the Iranian economy by as much as 10 to 20 percent.

However, Iran has recently discovered one simple trick to outwit President Donald Trump and the rest of the United States government officials: evading sanctions with Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Interviews with anonymous Iranian citizens claim that Bitcoin is the only way to move money out of the country, so it’s becoming more popular within the country.

This could be the reason why following the attacks on Iran, Bitcoin rallied and Iranians began paying as much as a 3x premium just to buy Bitcoin from website LocalBitcoins.

Could Evading Sanctions Be Partly Responsible for US Crypto Crackdown?

But it’s not just Iranian citizens relying on Bitcoin and crypto. Two Iranian individuals have had their Bitcoin addresses added to the Specially Designated Nationals List kept up to date by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.

And Iran is said to have been planning a digital version of the country’s native fiat currency, the rial, specifically to evade Trump-imposed economic sanctions.

While this hasn’t yet happened, the situation in Iran, North Korea’s increasing interest in crypto, and even the implications of Facebook’s Libra have caused the Trump administration and the US Treasury office to look closer at cryptocurrencies and their “illicit use.”

Related Reading | Trump Tweet Timing Coincides With Bitcoin Breakdowns

Trump even tweeted about his distaste towards Bitcoin and crypto in early July, just as the 2019 parabolic rally topped out.

Trump is only bound to dislike Bitcoin even more if Iran is able to continue to use Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to skate around his sanctions and continue to make a mockery of the President.