CBI Tightening Hold on Shadow Banks

At the request of the Central Bank of Iran, a department will be set up in one of the Tehran prosecutor's offices for investigating any violation made by the executives and shareholders of uncertified credit institutions.

This was announced in the latest meeting of Money and Credit Council, the nation's highest financial decision-making body, on Tuesday at the proposal of Prosecutor General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri, the official news website of CBI reported.

At the MCC meeting, CBI Governor Valiollah Seif presented the policymaker's latest report on handling the last of the illegal credit institutions and vowed to help return the lost deposits of people.

Shadow banks had previously owned a quarter of the country's liquidity, but as Seif said in an interview with Mehr News, "their share of the money market has currently been reduced to zero". As part of Tuesday's meeting, MCC also decreed that each traveler, including Iranian citizens or foreign nationals, is only allowed to bring in or take out a sum up to a ceiling of 50 million rials ($1,190) and will face punitive action in case of violating the ceiling.