The Treasury Department announced in a communique: “EIKO has made tens of billions of dollars in profit for the Iranian regime each year through the exploitation of favorable loan rates from Iranian banks and the sale and management of real estate holdings, including selling property donated to EIKO. EIKO has also confiscated properties in Iran that were owned by Iranians not living in Iran full-time.” These properties are then outrageously traded out of sight from international monitoring bodies. The Iranian government would also make huge investments under the guise of unregistered companies.
The press release also pointed out that they have been able to benefit from government trading companies in Europe and elsewhere. Out of the labyrinth of 37 companies involved that have been added to the list of US sanctions, some are based in Germany, Croatia and South Africa.
The History of EIKO
The Executive Committee of the Imam Khomeini’s Order is only one of the financial cartels in Iran’s economy. In the last five years, the only cartel to compete with the scale of EIKO’s many economic activities has been the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. EIKO, due to its relation with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and its rants (special rights and privileges), is a strong conglomerate, secure and free from any standard accounting, official monitoring or critique.