On Saturday, outflows from Iran’s leading exchange nearly tripled to almost $3 million following the airstrike that killed Khamenei.
Cryptocurrency outflows from Nobitex, Iran’s leading exchange, surged 700% on Saturday, reaching nearly $3 million. The spike occurred in the wake of the joint US-Israel airstrike that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other senior Iranian political and military figures, intensifying regional tensions and triggering fresh military confrontations.
According to blockchain analytics firm Elliptic, the phenomenon represents a capital flight from the country. “The spike in crypto asset outflows last Saturday potentially represents a capital flight from Iran,” wrote Tom Robinson, CEO of Elliptic, in a report published Monday. “Initial tracing of recent outflows from Nobitex suggests that funds are being sent to foreign exchanges that have historically recorded significant inflows from Iran.”
Nobitex allows the conversion of Iranian rials into digital assets, which can then be withdrawn to non-custodial wallets. “This makes it possible to move funds out of Iran while bypassing some of the oversight of the global banking system,” Robinson stated. The exchange has an estimated 11 million users and recorded $7.2 billion in crypto asset transactions in 2025. Its dominance within the local landscape is overwhelming: according to Chainalysis, Nobitex has recorded $11 billion in total historical inflows, compared to less than $7.5 billion for the next 10 Iranian exchanges combined.
Iran has increasingly turned to cryptocurrencies to circumvent sanctions imposed by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the United Nations. In January, Elliptic reported that the Iranian Central Bank had acquired approximately $507 million in USDT in an attempt to prop up the free-falling rial. Also in January, the imposition of new US sanctions on Iranian officials had already triggered two distinct waves of exchange outflows. A further spike occurred following the Internet blackout imposed by the regime on January 9, in the wake of widespread political protests, an episode also confirmed by Chainalysis.
