(Bloomberg) -- The UK government is cracking down on an oil trading empire led by Hossein Shamkhani, whose web of firms have drawn scrutiny for helping move Iranian and Russian crude around the world, people familiar with the matter said.
Companies House, the country’s corporate register, gave notice on Sept. 3 that London-based Nest Wise Trading Ltd. is to be struck off and dissolved within months if it doesn’t take requisite steps, a filing in its Gazette shows. The threatened action is due to the entity’s failure to provide sufficient information to regulators, who’ve concluded its ultimate beneficial owner is Shamkhani, according to people familiar with the UK’s deliberations.
The move by the British government, in the works for weeks, coincides with a broader effort by Washington and London to target entities that they suspect have been sidestepping oil-trading restrictions, said the people, who requested anonymity as they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
Late last month, Bloomberg News revealed the role that Shamkhani, whose father is a senior adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, plays in the world of Iranian and Russian oil trading. Nest Wise is a prominent entity within his network, and many of its employees work from a glitzy Dubai tower that’s home to companies central to Shamkhani’s operations, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter.
READ: Secretive Trader ‘Hector’ Seen as Global Kingpin for Iranian Oil
“Unless cause is shown to the contrary, the Company will be struck off the register and dissolved not less than 2 months from the date shown above,” UK Companies House said in its notice about Nest Wise.
Nest Wise’s business includes the sale of petroleum and petroleum products as well as fuels, ores, metals and industrial chemicals, UK Companies House records show. The filings also show that during the London entity’s incorporation, Dubai-based Nest Wise Petroleum LLC was the sole shareholder listed.
The Foreign Office declined to comment. A Companies House spokesperson said the agency doesn’t comment on individual companies. Neither of the Nest Wise entities nor Shamkhani responded to requests for comment.
Bloomberg’s months-long investigation interviewed more than three dozen people familiar with his businesses and examined documents that set out the scale of his operations, including the delivery of oil from both Iran and Russia. Shamkhani denied most details in the Bloomberg report, including owning any oil company, controlling a trading network or having a firm involved in commodities deals with Iran or Russia.
The US already sanctioned ships believed to be controlled by the Iranian businessman, Bloomberg reported. His father Ali, who served as naval commander for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, defense minister and then Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, was sanctioned by the Trump administration in early 2020.
The younger Shamkhani previously told Bloomberg that his father “never had nor does he have anything to do with my business activities.”
--With assistance from Ellen Milligan.
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