The United States Justice Department announced that Turkey’s Halkbank has agreed to a ‘delayed-prosecution’ deal, effectively signalling that charges in the US against the state-owned bank will be dropped.
The charges against Halkbank have long been a thorn-in-the-side for US-Turkish relations. In 2017, the bank was accused by American prosecutors of helping Iran evade US sanctions.
Following the news, shares in Halkbank jumped by 9%. Under the ‘delayed-prosecution deal reached Monday, Halkbank will neither admit to criminal wrongdoing nor be subject to a fine.
For months, signs had been pointing to the end of the Halkbank case.
In October 2025, Reuters reported that Turkey had offered the US $100 million to drop the case.
In an announcement around the same time, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan told reporters that US President Donald Trump had told him the case was ‘finished’.
Prosecutors alleged that Halkbank secretly transferred approximately $20 billion in funds through intermediary companies in Iran, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates. Oil revenues were allegedly converted into gold and cash to be sent to Iran, with forged food trade documents used to conceal the illicit transactions.
Case dropped against Turkey’s state-owned Halkbank | Written/translated for Medyascope by Leo Kendrick
