REUTERS — One of the world’s largest illegal gambling networks sends millions of dollars worth of crypto through an office in Dubai, part of a $4 billion Iranian operation to evade sanctions.

The office, above a budget hotel in an unfashionable neighborhood, is the listed address of Shelbit, an unlicensed crypto exchange run by an expatriate Iranian, according to data shared by two crypto investigative firms and an independent analyst, and reviewed by Reuters.

Among Shelbit’s main customers is a Farsi-language gambling network of more than 2,000 websites, fronted by two flashy Iranian influencers with high-level government connections – one operating from an expensive villa in Madrid and the other, until recently, from a luxury hotel in Hong Kong.

The two men and the Iranian running Shelbit were convicted as partners in crime in an illegal gambling case in Iran in 2023.

Gambling is outlawed in the Islamic Republic, punishable by lashing and prison. Yet, the gambling network identified by Reuters has access to Iran’s online payments system, which is closely overseen by the country’s central bank.

Shelbit is the hub of the Iranian money-moving operation, through which the gambling network, the central bank and other sanctioned Iranian entities have access to global crypto markets.

The data on the Shelbit money flows, including the total of at least $4 billion that the exchange has processed since May 2024, were analyzed by the two crypto investigative firms and Rich Sanders, an independent blockchain researcher and investigator focused on Iran. The two companies requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive data, which was reviewed by Reuters. Tens of millions of dollars of the gambling network’s crypto can be traced through blockchain records to Shelbit.

Shelbit has moved hundreds of millions in currency to some of the most prominent players in crypto, including the world’s biggest exchange, Binance.

Shelbit also interacts directly with Iran’s central bank; with wallets the Israeli government has linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps; and with Nobitex, an Iranian exchange which the US government sanctioned earlier this year after a Reuters investigation revealed its ties to the government. Some of the crypto that has flowed to Shelbit came from what the two crypto investigative companies say is an Iranian bitcoin mining operation, which mints new digital coins.

“It’s an IRGC operation, and that’s plain as day,” Sanders said of Shelbit.

The flows into Shelbit continued in the buildup to Iran’s war with the US and Israel that began in late February. The crypto kept coming even after the Islamic Republic repeatedly bombed the United Arab Emirates, including a drone that hit less than a kilometer from the exchange’s offices.

IRGC took over gambling sites to move money abroad

The revelation of the money-moving network shows the ingenuity behind Iran’s ability to weather years of punishing trade and banking sanctions. The IRGC has played a pivotal role in keeping the economy afloat during its on-again-off-again war with the United States and Israel, emerging more powerful than ever.

The Reuters investigation also found that, years ago, the IRGC took control of the largest gambling websites accessible inside Iran and has since used them to move money abroad.

Reuters spoke to more than 30 people to uncover the sanctions evasion network, including two formerly affiliated with the Guards, a former government official, two senior Iranian insiders with knowledge of the scheme, and people with direct knowledge of ongoing UAE government investigations into the operation. The gambling websites were identified and their relationships mapped in collaboration with the cybersecurity company Infoblox.

“This is by far the biggest Iranian illegal gambling network ever discovered and one of the biggest in the world,” said John Wojcik, a former researcher at Infoblox who spent seven years investigating illegal gambling for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Wojcik is now a senior analyst at TRM Labs.

It’s also one of the biggest Iranian sanctions evasion networks discovered since 2016, when the United States broke up a roughly $20 billion IRGC gold-for-oil operation based out of Turkey.

“It’s an IRGC operation, and that’s plain as day”

“It’s an IRGC operation, and that’s plain as day”

Reuters could not determine whether the IRGC had direct control of the gambling network and Shelbit, or who specifically in the Iranian state controlled the sanctions evasion operation. Reuters also could not determine where much of the crypto ultimately ended up.

UAE authorities are investigating

Dubai’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority, or VARA, is investigating Shelbit’s alleged role in helping Iran launder money and evade sanctions, according to a person with direct knowledge of the case. The exchange’s founder Siavash Kayvanpour, and the wider network of Iranians involved in crypto-based illegal gambling are also being scrutinized by the agency, the person said.

VARA confirmed that both it and the Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism had taken enforcement action in 2025 against Shelbit for operating without a license. On July 24, soon after Reuters requested comment from the authority, VARA issued a notice saying Shelbit was in violation of money-laundering and terrorism financing laws, ordering it to “cease and desist immediately from all unlicensed Virtual Asset activities.”

“The exposure identified by VARA extends beyond consumer protection to more egregious cross-border transactions with the propension to impact the integrity of the UAE financial system,” according to the notice issued on the VARA website.

Fronted by former minister’s scorned son and influencer

One of the men fronting the gambling operation, Sasha Sobhani, is the son of a former senior Iranian diplomat and government minister whose father has publicly disavowed him for what he described as un-Islamic behavior.

Another, Pooyan Mokhtari, is an influencer and singer who moved between luxury hotels in Hong Kong after being expelled in late April from Dubai, where he was arrested and accused by the authorities of financing Iranian terrorist organizations.

The pair flaunt their lavish lifestyles on social media, posting videos of luxury sports cars, yacht parties, and private jets.

Mokhtari denied the allegations leveled against him in Dubai and said he was not part of the IRGC or any Iranian........

© The Times of Israel