Less than a year out from President Trump’s May 2018 announcement that the United States is withdrawing from the JCPOA, Iran’s oil industry is struggling more than many anticipated.

Before Donald Trump’s announcement, Iran was exporting over 2.5 million bpd. As of December – one month after sanctions on the banking, oil, and shipping sectors came back into effect – Iran was exporting just 1.1 million bpd.

The downswing is having a predictable effect on Iran’s economy, and President Hassan Rouhani recently warned that his country is facing its most severe economic challenge in 40 years.

The export numbers came in considerably worse than expectations, especially given the fact that the US government was unexpectedly lax with initial enforcement, granting China, India, Greece, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Turkey six-month exceptions from the sanction regime back in November.

With these waivers in place, market watchers were anticipating a relatively muted effect on Iran’s exports, at least for the first for months of 2019. Imports from just China, India, Korea, and Turkey alone amounted to around 1.65 million barrels per day before sanctions were enacted last year.