Seatrade-Maritime: Can Venezuela’s oil production become investible?

Published by Seatrade-Maritime

At the time Trump administration’s seizure of Venezuela’s leader Nicolas Maduro in January oil industry executives described the country’s petroleum business as “not investible”.

In the latest action from the Trump 2.0, the US President announced a huge deal with Venezuela with the aim of making it “investable”, and, in effect, dramatically increasing the effective oil supply available to US energy producers.

Even before the latest declaration from the White House, there were signs of improvement. Poten’s Director of Tanker Research Erik Broekhuizen had written, earlier in August, that: “While the country’s oil industry faces enormous challenges due to decades of corruption, underinvestment and infrastructure decay, there has been some progress in Venezuela’s crude oil production and exports are starting to recover.”

Following the Trump announcement, analysts at Rystad Energy opined that “Rystad Energy analysis indicates the deal could materially reshape Venezuela’s long-term production trajectory, but the recovery is likely to be gradual, initially brownfield-led, and subject to significant political, contractual and execution risk.” The deal is centered around North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP)- a large operator owned by Venezuelan politically-connected oil magnate Alejandro Betancourt, which will be given concessions to drill.

Following the Trump announcement, analysts at Rystad Energy opined that “Rystad Energy analysis indicates the deal could materially reshape Venezuela’s long-term production trajectory, but the recovery is likely to be gradual, initially brownfield-led, and subject to significant political, contractual and execution risk.” The deal is centered around North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP)- a large operator owned by Venezuelan politically-connected oil magnate Alejandro Betancourt, which will be given concessions to drill.