Iran Strikes andWaging War with Gold…
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I was on KET yesterday to talk the Iran strikes and to demonstrate that it’s possible for an LGM frontpager to wear a damn tie. I also did a pod about the latest book with Bill Miller of Global Connections. The Iran-Israel War does have some other financial aspects:
An Israel-linked hacking group has claimed responsibility for a $90m (£67m) heist on an Iranian cryptocurrency exchange.
The group known as Gonjeshke Darande, Farsi for Predatory Sparrow, said on Wednesday it had hacked the Nobitex exchange, a day after claiming it had destroyed data at Iran’s state-owned Bank Sepah.
Elliptic, a consultancy specialising in crypto-related crime, said it had so far identified more than $90m in cryptocurrency sent from Nobitex crypto wallets to hacker addresses. The hackers appear to have in effect “burned” those funds, rendering them inaccessible by storing them in “vanity addresses” for which they do not have the cryptographic keys, Elliptic said.
See also the Economist on battle damage assessments and on the possibility of secret facilities:
Fordow was originally a secret project, revealed by Western countries in 2009. The question now is whether Iran has other intact secret facilities and a sufficient stock of HEU hidden away with which to restart the programme away from prying eyes. Iran had previously threatened to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. If it does so now, IAEA inspectors would have no way to observe Iran’s future nuclear work. Nevertheless, Israel’s spies have displayed an extraordinary ability to penetrate Iran’s nuclear enterprise and security forces, and have repeatedly assassinated nuclear scientists and generals.
Long story short, we are filled with a lack of certainty on how badly damaged the Iranian program is and on how long it will take Iran to reconstitute. The last point is worth emphasizing; the Iranian government is so shot through with Israeli intelligence that it would be surprising at this point to learn that the Iranians had something left that they could keep secret from Washington and Jerusalem.