Even once the terms of the Iran nuclear accord go into effect U.S. companies won’t be rushing in to do business in the country anytime soon, or later, The Hill reported.
Lingering sanctions and the threat of new action will prevent the vast majority of American companies from setting up shop in Iran — even while their foreign competitors race in.
“If you’re a U.S. company, the day after implementation day is going to look a lot like the day before implementation day,” said Richard Nephew, who worked on Iran sanctions within the Obama administration and is now a program director at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy.
“I’m really, really skeptical that any major U.S. companies are going to want to tread in that space until they are pretty sure that they’re not going to get bitten as a result of this.”
“It would be a big mistake,” agreed Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), one of the few Senate Democrats to oppose the deal, “because there’s going to be still a whole host of other sanctions that will still exist for Iran’s non-nuclear transgressions, and it is likely that we will see other sanctions come down the road.”
In fact, except for caviar, carpets and a few other specific areas, the U.S. economic relationship with Iran won’t change much at all.
The vast majority of U.S. sanctions,will only be lifted on foreign companies — not American firms.
“We are not removing our trade embargo on Iran,” a senior administration official said in a recent briefing with reporters. “U.S. persons and banks will still be generally prohibited from all dealings with Iranian companies, including investing in Iran [and] facilitating cleared country trade with Iran.”
The U.S, will eventually allow imports of Iranian carpets and foodstuffs including caviar and pistachios. Those shipments serve a symbolic purpose but aren’t likely to have a transformational effect on the Iranian economy, analysts said.
In any case, corporate America doesn’t appear to be chomping at the bit to rush in to Iran, which may be in part due to the threat of new sanctions from Congress.
Meanwhile, as GOP presidential candidates are quick to remind people, the terms of the deal could be abandoned with the stroke of a pen from the next resident of the White House.
Those comments might cause businesses to be wary of investing heavily in a legal opening that could close in just 16 months.
 “The bottom line is U.S. companies and U.S. persons will be more constrained, because we will have what is essentially a unilateral, U.S.-only embargo,” said William McGlone, a partner at the Latham & Watkins law firm who specializes in export controls and sanctions.
The main target of that foreign activity is likely to be energy, though the degree to which American firms get in on the game remains a question mark.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said he doesn’t expect many U.S. companies to join the parade to Iran, citing uncertainty about the stability of the country’s legal system and its lax environmental regulations.