Zabihollah Khodaian, the head of Iran’s General Inspection Organization, dropped a number that should make anyone paying attention to sanctions enforcement sit up straight: more than €94 billion in foreign currency earned from exports has never been repatriated to Iran.
The capital flight problem keeps getting worse
This isn’t a new phenomenon, but the scale is accelerating. Back in 2020, Iran disclosed €16 billion in unrepatriated earnings over just a 2.5-year window. The current figure of €94 billion represents a far deeper rot.
A separate parliamentary figure paints an even grimmer picture: $116 billion in non-oil export earnings reportedly failed to return to Iran between 2018 and late 2025.
International sanctions have effectively cut Iran off from the SWIFT banking network and most conventional trade finance channels. Exporters who manage to sell goods, particularly petrochemicals and minerals, often find it nearly impossible to route payments back through compliant financial institutions.
