Pezeshkian says Iran's trade has fallen 35 percent under the US blockade

President Masoud Pezeshkian told Iranian state media on Friday that exports and imports have slumped by nearly 35 percent under US sanctions and a naval blockade of Iranian ports. Reuters placed the remarks at the six-month mark of the war with the United States. Annual inflation hit 66 percent last month. The White House has billed the latest financial campaign as an economic D-Day and as Operation Economic Outcast.

Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei issued a written Government Week message the same day. He has not been seen in public since 28 February, when an attack killed his father, Ali Khamenei, and left him injured. The text told the government to deal with inflation, unemployment and prices, to steer investment into domestic production, to manage imports, and to phase the dollar out of a central role. Resistance Economy, the old slogan, was named as the centre of policy. He also told officials that anything that harms social cohesion is forbidden. Shortcomings, he said, should be handled without giving adversaries a quote.

The Institute for the Study of War noted the sequence. Mojtaba's channel warned officials not to advertise the slump. Pezeshkian then went on air and named the slump. The president tied the damage to the war, the sanctions and the blockade. The leader's office tied the remedy to production and silence. Those are not the same brief.

Treasury moved on Friday as well. It sanctioned the Emirati branch of Egypt's Banque Misr, saying the branch processed nearly $1.8 billion for 103 companies that may sit in Iranian shadow-banking networks between January 2024 and June 2026. It also listed Reza Mohammad Taeedi, general manager of Bank Melli's Dubai branch, and a Hong Kong firm accused of helping designated Iranians reach the financial system. Washington has warned other countries to cut commercial ties or face secondary sanctions. It has not, Reuters noted, hit China or India, the two large buyers whose punishment would rebound on energy prices.

Hormuz remains the physical half of the blockade story. Iran has said the strait stays closed until Washington meets a written list. Pre-war traffic through the waterway was about a fifth of seaborne oil and LNG. A 35 percent drop in Iran's own trade is the domestic number. The strait is the number that still sits on other countries' import bills, including India's.

Khamenei's dollar line is programmatic rather than operational. Iran already invoices what it can in other currencies. Phasing the dollar out of a pivotal role is a direction, not a switch. Production growth under 66 percent inflation is the harder instruction. The tools on offer are the same ones hardline offices have listed for years: manage prices, grow output, keep public talk narrow. ISW pointed out that those tools have not closed the gap before.

The war's six-month mark is the political calendar Washington is using. Trump sold the campaign as a short excursion. Friday's sanctions list is what a longer war looks like in a spreadsheet: a bank branch in Dubai, a manager's name, a Hong Kong shelf company. Pezeshkian's 35 percent is what it looks like in a customs hall. The two figures belong together. One is the pressure. The other is the result the leader has now told his officials not to describe too loudly.