TRM Labs Says CoinEx Was the Largest External Crypto Exit Route for Iran Since 2019

Blockchain analytics firm TRM Labs says it traced $3.84 billion in flows from wallets linked to more than 60 sanctioned Iranian entities through CoinEx since 2019. For compliance teams, the useful part is not the headline number but the structure: TRM says CoinEx became the main external conduit for Iran-linked capital moving into global crypto markets, with clear implications for sanctions screening and exchange-to-exchange risk.

1. TRM Labs traced $3.84 billion in flows from wallets linked to more than 60 sanctioned Iranian entities through CoinEx since 2019. The firm identified CoinEx as the primary external conduit for Iran-linked capital moving into global crypto markets.
2. Of that total, $2.7 billion flowed between CoinEx and Nobitex, Iran’s largest domestic exchange, at an average rate of approximately $1 million per day since 2018. TRM says this is the largest single-exchange crypto sanctions-evasion pipeline tied to Iran yet identified.
3. The report came three weeks after the US Treasury sanctioned four Iranian crypto exchanges as part of its Economic Fury campaign. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent separately said the US had seized $1 billion in crypto from Iranian exchanges and wallets since the start of the war.
4. CoinEx itself was not among the sanctioned entities. That is the gap TRM is pointing at: the blockchain data shows large-scale activity, while enforcement action so far has not reached CoinEx.
5. TRM says CoinEx’s share of illicit transaction volume is nearly 8%, versus a 0.3% threshold observed at compliant exchanges, or roughly 27 times the benchmark. The firm also says CoinEx was Nobitex’s largest external counterpart by volume in 2024, nearly nine times larger than the next-biggest exchange.

TRM further said major Iranian domestic exchanges route between 5% and 10% of their trading volume through CoinEx, a consistency across platforms that the firm described as not fitting independent market behavior. For PSPs and exchanges handling crypto exposure, the message is straightforward: exchange-to-exchange concentration can become a sanctions problem long before it looks like one on the surface.