Recent turmoil in Venezuela and Iran has once again highlighted the duality of stablecoins, in which US dollar-backed assets such as TEACHER have served as a savior for ordinary citizens and a tool for blacklisted institutions to evade sanctions.

Both Venezuela and Iran are grabbing headlines at the start of 2026 amid political uncertainty and civil unrest. Both faced with restrictions, inflation, political instability and cost-driven crises, cryptos and stablecoins have become an important part of the ecosystem.

Iran’s stability is confused

Iran has seen protests erupt across the country over the past two weeks amid worsening economic conditions and the Iranian rial tanking to record lows against the US dollar.

The situation has escalated from local protests to large-scale demonstrations across Iran, with thousands arrested and hundreds killed. According to reports Against this backdrop, the Iranian government also moved to cut off domestic internet access on Thursday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caovgmkex8c

Cryptos and stablecoins have become an important resource for citizens in Iran, given that the Iranian rial has been falling in value against the US dollar for decades.

There is a Tron-based teacher (USDT). According to reports The most widely used asset in the country, the asset is used to hedge inflation and systemic risk with citizens.

Wider adoption ended in 2025, however, with a significant number of hacks and teacher blacklistings on the nation’s largest exchange. Meanwhile, the government also fixed the annual limit At Stable Queens in late September, citizens are allowed a maximum purchase of $10,000 and a maximum purchase of $5,000 per person.

But stablecoins have also been used by approved institutions. A report from blockchain analytics firm TRM Labs on Friday indicates That since 2023, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has allegedly transferred $1 billion in stablecoins through two “UK-based front companies” called ZCX and ZXen.

The report claims that despite the two firms publicly presenting themselves as individual firms, they are quietly working together “as a financial infrastructure for the IRGC.”

“In practice, they operate as a single enterprise embedded within the vast evasion ecosystem of Iranian sanctions, pushing value across borders, currencies and jurisdictions on behalf of one of the world’s most heavily sanctioned military organizations,” TRM Labs said.

“A key figure in this network is Babak Zanjani, a longtime Iran sanctions financier previously sanctioned by government agencies, including the IRGC, for laundering billions in oil proceeds,” TRM Labs added.

Venezuela is closely tied to the USDT

Like the Iranians, Venezuelans have adopted the USDT to protect themselves from economic uncertainty, as the Venezuelan bolivar has plunged over the past decade.

Related: Fiat inflation drove crypto adoption around the world

A severe lack of trust in banks has reportedly led to such widespread adoption of USDT that everyday people use the asset to pay for all sorts of everyday services, choosing to hold crypto wallets instead of using bank accounts.

71-year-old Venezuelan crypto-entrepreneur Mauricio de Bartolomeo told In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, he added:

“Stablecoin adoption has gone so far in Venezuela that even where you can buy and sell them, people choose to go for stablecoins as opposed to using local banks.”

The WSJ also highlighted that USDT is heavily used by Petroleos de Venezuela, Venezuela’s state-run oil company. The firm reportedly started demanding payments directly in stablecoin to avoid restrictions that were first imposed back in 2020.

The company is Estimated Accepting 80% of all oil revenue by the teacher and frequently using assets to settle incoming and outgoing payments.

The teacher uses blacklists to fight the approvers

The WSJ report added that Techer is fighting this by cooperating with the US government to blacklist “dozens of wallets” linked to domestic oil trading.