The Trump administration announced on Friday that it has imposed sanctions on a Turkish financial institution, its latest move to sever what officials call “critical financial lifelines” for the Iranian government.

The measures target Golden Global Yatirim Bankasi Anonim Sirketi, and follow Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s launch last week of “Operation Economic Outcast,” Washington’s new initiative to isolate already heavily sanctioned Iran from its remaining trading partners in an effort to force Tehran to capitulate to U.S. demands after more than six months of war.

The Treasury Department accused the Turkish bank and its entities of having been established to enable Iran’s transfer of oil revenues from China to Turkey, where the funds could be converted into cash and gold. China, which has remained a major buyer of Iranian crude despite U.S. sanctions, lies at the center of this revenue channel; the new action underscores how Washington’s sanctions effort now reaches beyond Tehran itself to the intermediary financial plumbing that moves its oil money. The department also said the institution “knowingly offered” banking services to Iranian financial entities, including some sanctioned by the U.S. government in 2022 for funneling Tehran’s oil sales.

Bessent, who told The Associated Press earlier this week that another bank would face economic penalties, warned that financial institutions with ties to Iran will “continue to find out the hard way that we are serious about Operation Economic Outcast.”

“While we hope no more banks will need to be sanctioned, that ultimately depends on how quickly the international community comes to its senses and ceases support of the murderous Iranian regime,” Bessent said in a press release Friday. “We know who you are, we know where you are, and we will continue to take action together with our allies and partners until we have buried the head of the Iranian snake.”

So far, however, the campaign’s goal of forcing countries still doing business with Iran to cut financial ties or face U.S. retaliation has fallen flat. Promises of an “economic D-Day” aimed at a group of countries that could include China and India have quickly given way to warnings and negotiations with Iran’s trading partners.

Bessent previously told reporters that he wanted countries to have an opportunity to shift away from Iran before it was too late, in an effort to avoid upending the global financial system.

The administration’s reluctance to penalize major trading partners still dealing with Iran was evident last week, when the U.S. moved to limit an Egyptian bank’s operations in the United Arab Emirates but stopped short of imposing sanctions. The gap between the harsh rhetoric directed at smaller institutions and the caution shown toward larger economies is likely to be watched closely by banks and governments weighing whether continued Iran business carries real risk.

The U.S. has also resumed military strikes in recent days, prompting Iranian retaliation in the region. The outcome of the two-pronged strategy remains unclear for President Donald Trump, who has struggled to end an unpopular war with an intransigent Iranian government as rising energy prices pose political problems for Republicans ahead of November’s midterm congressional elections.

The latest sanctions target Golden Global Investment Bank, founded in 2019 as Turkey’s first investment bank to offer “banking services and alternative financing methods” to foreign companies, according to its website. The Istanbul-based bank, largely unfamiliar to most Turks, says it aims to increase Turkey’s foreign trade through target markets in neighboring countries. For Turkey, a NATO member that has long maintained commercial and energy ties with Iran, the case is the second high-profile U.S. enforcement action against a Turkish bank over Iranian oil money.

The Treasury announcement came a day after Turkey’s state-run Halkbank said it had reached a settlement with the U.S. Justice Department in a nine-year case centered on violating Iran sanctions. In that case, senior Halkbank officials were said to have illegally moved about $20 billion worth of Iranian oil revenues, and U.S. prosecutors claimed high-ranking Turkish government officials received millions of dollars in bribes to protect the scheme.

The Halkbank case caused a rift in U.S.-Turkey relations, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan personally lobbying the White House to have the case dropped.