This illuminates what I’ve been saying: Trump’s strong-arming, transactional approach won’t work in geopolitics — because once allies don’t trust you, they start building systems that work around you.
Here’s clear real-world example: Europe is increasingly serious about reducing dependence on U.S.-controlled “chokepoints” — including payments infrastructure dominated by Visa and Mastercard.
For an overview, watch this video:
The point that Trump and the “America First” people miss is that global firms want to be global
The whole “we’re big enough” logic being pushed now assumes U.S. companies can just retreat into the domestic market and thrive. But that’s not how profit maximization within capitalist logics works for global firms. Increasing returns on capital and maximizing profit means expanding — entering new markets, deepening access, becoming embedded in other economies, staying welcome there, and creating global economies of scale.
When you make other countries feel they can’t trust you — not just morally, but strategically — they don’t simply complain. They start building parallel infrastructures so they don’t have to depend on you.
Payments are not “just finance.” They’re geopolitical plumbing.
Within this logic, of diversification of risk, Europe’s moves make total sense. Payments networks aren’t just convenience — they’re rails of sovereignty: fees, standards, data, routing power, and leverage. So Europe has been backing initiatives aimed at building European-controlled payment options, including the European Payments Initiative (EPI) and its wallet brand Wero (see: Wero’s official site).
And at the state/central bank level, you can watch the same sovereignty logic in the push around a digital euro (European Central Bank overview): if your payments and settlement layers are structurally dependent on private firms headquartered elsewhere, you are vulnerable — especially when alliances start to feel unstable.
This is why strong-arming transactionalism fails
Trump’s worldview treats geopolitics like isolated deals: squeeze the other side, win the moment, move on. But global integration doesn’t work like that. In an interdependent world, trust is infrastructure. And when you break trust, people don’t just “get mad” — they rewire their interdependencies.
That rewiring is where the real cost shows up: not as one dramatic breakup, but as a slow and steady loss of market access and embeddedness. A world that feels pushed around by the U.S. doesn’t have to “defeat” the U.S. — it can just build systems that reduce U.S. leverage (and quietly reduce U.S. profits).
The punchline: the U.S. loses billions by teaching allies to route around it
If Europe successfully expands European payment rails and standards, U.S. firms lose more than fees. They lose long-term entrenchment, influence, and the default position that comes from being “the system.” That is exactly what strong-arming creates: incentive for others to build a world where they don’t need you. And while the BRICS countries were already trying to create a more equitable system regarding dollar exchange systems, to imagine Europe trying to decouple itself from US financial power is another level.
This shows the limits of transactional geopolitics: while it may extract advantage for the U.S., even U.S. firms in the short term, it plants the seeds for current allies to build alternatives that lock U.S. firms out and diminish U.S. interests over the long term.
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