Two UK-registered cryptocurrency exchanges, Zedcex and Zedxion, operated as front companies for an infrastructure that processed approximately $1 billion in funds linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), according to new analysis from TRM Labs. 

The blockchain analysis firm said IRGC-linked flows accounted for roughly 56% of the exchanges’ total volume overall, peaking at 87% in 2024. The exchanges collectively processed $23.7 million in IRGC-linked flows in 2023, rising to $619.1 million in 2024, before falling to $410.4 million in 2025 as non-IRGC activity increased. 

TRM said the corporate trail suggests Zedcex and Zedxion functioned as “a single exchange” despite being registered as separate companies. UK filings suggest the front companies used “straw-person” directors, virtual office addresses, and repeated dormancy declarations that conflicted with the on-chain volume, TRM concluded.

Zedxion was incorporated in May 2021 and an individual identified as Babak Morteza was appointed director and “person with significant control” in October of that year. 

As TRM notes, Babak Morteza Zanjani had previously been sanctioned by the U.S. and EU in 2013 in connection with alleged sanctions-evasion activity involving an IRGC-linked company. Zanjani is believed to be a “longtime Iranian sanctions-evasion financier previously sanctioned for laundering billions in oil revenue,” TRM said.

The second cryptocurrency exchange, Zedcex, was incorporated in mid-2022, “just days” after Zanjani’s formal exit from Zedxion and listed the same successor director and the same virtual office address, according to TRM. Both companies continued filing dormant accounts and routine confirmations through June 2025. 

TRM said it had linked Zedcex wallets to addresses designated by Israeli authorities as IRGC property, adding that many of the wallets were also blocklisted by Tether. The transactions were “almost entirely” in USDT on TRON, routing funds between IRGC-linked addresses, offshore intermediaries, and Iranian crypto services including Nobitex, Wallex, and Aban Tether, according to the report. 

Zanjani, who was previously arrested and sentenced to death for embezzling funds from Iran’s National Oil Company (NIOC) only to have his sentence commuted in 2024, is now engaged in sanctions busting through DotOne Holding Group, “a conglomerate spanning cryptocurrency, foreign exchange, logistics, transportation, aviation, and telecommunications,” TRM reported. 

Read more at TRM Labs