US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said Washington has seized “close to half a billion” in Iranian cryptocurrency assets and that its “Operation Economic Fury” has sent the government in Tehran into “crisis”, Al Jazeera reports.

“We were able to grab about 350 million crypto assets, and then on top of another 100 that we had recently gotten, so we’re almost at half a billion there, and we are freezing bank accounts everywhere,” Bessent told Fox News.

He said Trump had ordered the economic pressure campaign in March of last year and told him to “up the pressure again” about three weeks ago.

“We have gone to the buyers of Iranian oil and told them that … we are willing to do secondary sanctions on your industries, on your banks who tolerate Iranian oil in their system,” he said.

Bessent added that the economic campaign and the US naval blockade on Iranian ports will inflict permanent damage on Iran’s economy.