Rubbish Check
CNBC Finance · 13 August 2026
source“Iran looks to ramp up economic alliance with BRICS nations as war with U.S. drags on”
R5/ 10
Selective
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
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In short
Rubbish Talk rates CNBC's claim that Iran is "set to join" the BRICS New Development Bank a 5/10 because the story's own primary source, the NDB itself, told CNBC it "cannot confirm" Iran's membership, and Iran doesn't appear on the bank's list of current prospective members.
The Verdict
Selective. The entire news hook rests on one unconfirmed statement from Iran's central bank governor, relayed via Iranian state media, while the article's own on-record source, the NDB, explicitly declines to confirm it. That caveat is real and disclosed, so this isn't manufactured, but the headline's confident framing outruns what's actually been verified.
What actually happened
Iran's central bank governor Abdolnasser Hemmati told Iranian state media he expects Iran to soon join the BRICS New Development Bank, speaking from India ahead of the upcoming BRICS summit. When CNBC asked the NDB directly, the bank said it could not confirm this and noted its most recent new member was Uzbekistan, which officially joined in June 2026.
Key facts
- Claim source: Iranian state media reported that Abdolnasser Hemmati, governor of the Central Bank of Iran, had announced Iran would soon become a member of the BRICS bank, while Hemmati was in India ahead of the BRICS summit.
- Primary source pushback: A spokesperson for the NDB told CNBC the bank cannot confirm information regarding Iran's membership, noting membership is open to UN member states and both borrowing and non-borrowing countries.
- Most recent confirmed accession: NDB recently welcomed Uzbekistan as its tenth member country, which officially joined the bank on June 5, 2026.
- Iran is not yet in the pipeline: Iran would have to move through the NDB's accession process before it can become an official member country, and current prospective members are Uruguay, Colombia, Ethiopia, Angola and Zimbabwe.
- Economic backdrop cited: The war with the U.S. and Israel has further ramped up the pressure on the Iranian economy, with inflation surging, growth plummeting and its currency in free fall.
- Trade leverage: China bought more than 80% of Iran's shipped oil in 2025, according to Kpler data.
What to watch for
- Watch whether Iran actually appears on the NDB's prospective-member list at the September BRICS summit; until then this is a state-media claim, not a confirmed accession.
- Watch how Trump's threatened 25% tariffs on buyers of Iranian goods interact with China's dominant purchasing role, since that's the real economic lever, not bank membership.
- Watch for a follow-up NDB statement; a formal confirmation or denial would resolve the core uncertainty this headline currently glosses over.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
