Banco Exterior de Cuba

Banco Exterior de Cuba is the Cuban state bank that finances the island's foreign trade. The US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) added it to the Specially Designated Nationals list on 3 September 2026, under the Cuba programme set by Executive Order 14404, in the same notice as four state fuel and mining traders.

Cuba created the bank by Decree-Law 198 of 8 November 1999 as an autonomous state bank with its own legal personality. In December 2021 the Banco Central de Cuba reissued its licence as a corporate bank, covering accounts in pesos and foreign currency, trade credit, bank guarantees and direct dealings with foreign export-credit insurers. OFAC's listing gives its address as Plaza de la Revolución, Havana, and its SWIFT code as BECUCUHH.

The designation followed OFAC's 23 June listing of Banco Financiero Internacional, the main foreign-currency clearing bank, and came two weeks after Washington blocked the Ministry of Construction and the state nickel-mining monopoly. Because the bank finances trade, the listing reaches the credit behind Cuban imports rather than any single cargo. Havana's position, repeated since June, is that such measures fall on Cubans on state wages rather than on the leadership.