US to sanction unnamed large bank Monday as part of campaign to pressure Tehran

The U.S. Treasury, led by Secretary Scott Bessent, announced the Trump administration will impose sanctions on a large bank on Monday, though officials did not disclose the bank’s name or its country.

Bessent told Real America’s Voice that the designation was delayed from Friday to Monday because of ceremonies marking the 25th anniversary of the September 11, 2001, attacks and framed the measure as part of a continued campaign to pressure Tehran.

The administration has mounted a broad economic campaign against Iran since February, targeting oil exports, shipping networks, weapons procurement channels, financial intermediaries, digital-asset exchanges and aviation links; Bessent said the goal is to make it unprofitable to deal with the Iranian government and signaled potential personal and corporate penalties for violators.

Last month’s Operation Economic Outcast, the Treasury move that sanctioned nearly 60 entities, individuals and vessels and broadened secondary sanctions, set the precedent for the bank action and underscores an escalation in financial targeting.

The Treasury did not provide evidence in the cited remarks tying the unnamed bank to specific transactions, and Bessent declined to identify the jurisdiction involved; that omission leaves open whether the bank is a major institution inside Iran, a regional bank facilitating Iranian business, or a larger international bank used by Iranian actors.

Administration officials presented the measure as a next step in a stepped-up sanctions campaign; the source does not include responses from the bank, its home government, or third-party financial regulators.

How foreign banks and commercial partners will react to a high-profile, unnamed designation — whether by rapidly cutting ties or challenging secondary measures — will shape the measure’s effectiveness and the economic squeeze the U.S. is attempting to apply to Iranian state finances.