This chart is nearly a year old. That was before Trump went sanctions crazed.

What happens to the strength of a sanctions threat after everyone of consequence is already sanctioned?

The Trump administration escalated its battle with European allies over the fate of the Iran nuclear accord, threatening penalties against the financial body created by Germany, the U.K. and France to shield trade with the Islamic Republic from U.S. sanctions. Sigal Mandelker, the Treasury Department’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, signaled in a May 7 letter obtained by Bloomberg that Instex, the European vehicle to sustain trade with Tehran, and anyone associated with it could be barred from the U.S. financial system if it goes into effect.

...

A senior official involved in the internal debate that led to the letter said the U.S. decided to issue the threat after concluding that European officials, who had earlier downplayed the significance of Instex in conversations with the Trump administration, were far more serious about it than they had initially let on.

Instex was created at the very top of the European political system. If Washington is serious then this will instantly become a political issue.



This map is dated

Meanwhile, Washington is looking to sanction our European allies for a different reason.



US sanctions against the controversial Nord Stream-2 pipeline from Russia to Germany are unlikely stop the project’s construction but may prevent Russian gas monopoly Gazprom from using the pipeline at full capacity in the future, Alexei Kokin, a senior oil and gas analyst at UralSib Financial Corp in Moscow, told New Europe on 23 May.

Anyone that buys Russian weapons also gets the threat of sanctions.

That includes Turkey, Pakistan, and India.



In 2010, Russian President Vladimir Putin upgraded the relationship to a “special and privileged” strategic partnership. When Russia forcibly annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, the West protested, but India supported Russia. In 2015, India became the world’s largest importer of armaments with most of those imports coming from Russia. From 2009 to 2013, Russia supplied roughly 75 percent of India’s arms imports.

India is also tempting fate with Iranian oil. However, it is China that is taking the lead in breaking U.S. sanctions on Iran's oil.



Hong Kong dismissed U.S. warnings that it could face penalties if it it does business with an oil tanker headed for the city that allegedly violated sanctions on Iran.

If we follow through with our threats, roughly 3.5 billion people on the planet will be under U.S. sanctions.

At this point a non-U.S. financial market can become very profitable, especially since you will have billions of customers that you won't have to compete with Wall Street or London for.