Trump sees US oil giants driving Venezuela oil rebound. Energy execs are wary.

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Politico

01/03/2026 02:35 PM EST


American oil companies have long hoped to recover the assets that Venezuela’s authoritarian regime ripped from them decades ago. Now the Trump administration is offering to help them achieve that aim — with one major condition.

Administration officials have told oil executives in recent weeks that if they want compensation for their rigs, pipelines and other seized property, then they must be prepared to go back into Venezuela now and invest heavily in reviving its shattered petroleum industry, two people familiar with the administration’s outreach told POLITICO on Saturday. The outlook for Venezuela’s shattered oil infrastructure is one of the major questions following the U.S. military action that captured leader Nicolás Maduro.

But people in the industry said the administration’s message has left them still leery about the difficulty of rebuilding decayed oil fields in a country where it’s not even clear who will lead the country for the foreseeable future. “They’re saying, ‘you gotta go in if you want to play and get reimbursed,’” said one industry official familiar with the conversations.

The offer has been on the table for the last 10 days, the person said. “But the infrastructure currently there is so dilapidated that no one at these companies can adequately assess what is needed to make it operable.”

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/03/trump-venezuela-oil-us-companies-return-00709782

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[Skittles]

1. so the interim leader wants Maduro returned, and even US oil execs are wary

SOUNDS LIKE A WELL THOUGHT OUT PLAN

[patphil]

2. Trump's handing them a basket of snakes.

The cost will be enormous, with at least several years to get a good ROI. In the meantime, how stable will the new government be, and will there be guerrilla warfare waged against the "American invaders"?
I don't expect US companies to jump into this without a lot of thought and preparation.

Sounds like a quagmire to me. If I was an oil executive, I'd hold back for a year or two.

[Klarkashton]

3. Apparently the crude oil is full of tar.

This is a real mess.

[Igel]

6. Always has been.

And that's the problem. Not a lot of refineries are geared up for that kind of crude.

Houston had refineries with that kind of crude in mind. Don't know their status or if they've been reconfigured and altered for only lighter grades.

[Klarkashton]

7. I've been seeing this propaganda about how it's

Really desirable. It's never been desirable.

[Bluetus]

19. Citgo still has a big retail footprint and about 4% of the US refining capacity

Their 3 refineries are built to handle heavy, "sour" crude. I don't know where they are getting this crude from because there have been sanctions against Venezuela for decades. This was the whole reason for the Keystone Pipeline. The Canada oil is also heavy, and they wanted to send it to Citgo's refineries, which were built for that. I guess they are now transporting it by rail.

Citgo is in the process of a corporate restructure that was not have any Venezuelan ownership. However, they would probably be able to refine Venezuelan oil transported by tanker. But that still leaves a supply/demand issue. Light, sweet crude is about $60/bbl, and that's very low. The Venezuelan stuff would probably be worth $45/bbl. It is not clear any oil company would want to take any of this at today's prices. Much of the last 20 years, the bbl price for light, sweet was around $100. That is to say, if Trump just handed the oil fields to one of his friends, they might want to pump as fast as they can and take it to the US gulf coast for refining because their product cost is zero. But this would drive down everybody else's prices.

[ananda]

8. And very difficult to refine.

A mess all right.

[thought crime]

4. China is/was the biggest buyer of Venezuelan oil.

[underpants]

5. "incentive" means we pay for their investment

and as good as the military plan was….they still dropped the ball.

“We’re going to rebuild the oil infrastructure, which requires billions of dollars that will be paid for by the oil companies directly,” Trump said. “They will be reimbursed for what they’re doing, but it’s going to be paid, and we’re going to get the oil flowing.”
However, the administration’s outreach to U.S. oil company executives remains “at its best in the infancy stage,” said one industry executive familiar with the discussions, who was granted anonymity to describe conversations with the president’s team.
“In preparation for regime change, there had been engagement. But it’s been sporadic and relatively flatly received by the industry,” this person said. “It feels very much a shoot-ready-aim exercise.”

[EarthFirst]

9. So once again; tens of billions for regime change and infrastructure development...

…however no money for healthcare; education or social safety nets.

[AK Grizz]

10. Can trump bury the epstein files N O W

Is there anything he Won't do to take Jeffery's name out of our mouths?

[cstanleytech]

11. Instead of rebuilding infrastructure in a foreign country he should be rebuilding it here in the United States.

[ancianita]

14. Amen.

[NickB79]

12. Any US attempts to extract oil will be met with guerilla warfare

Expect a lot of IED's, assassinations and blown-up supply convoys if US oil nationals send in contractors.

And then Trump will lose his shit and send in American troops to do urban and jungle warfare, and we'll be bogged down just like Iraq and Vietnam.

[BidenRocks]

13. Decades ago.

You know the insurance has paid losses and the enormous tax write-offs spent. The book is closed.

Under those rules, the Native Americans can kick our ass out. Past losses of a way of life beats oil.

[ancianita]

15. Here, WIRED includes quotes on what Trump has said re VZ oil ...

... At Saturday's press conference, he indicated that his administration has plans to rebuild the Venezuelan oil infrastructure and recover the oil that, according to the president, was “stolen” from the United States several decades ago.

“Venezuela unilaterally seized and sold American oil, American assets, and American platforms, costing us billions and billions of dollars,” Trump claimed. “We are going to have our very large United States oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure … and start making money for the country.”

Trump's statements mainly refer to the expropriation process promoted by the Venezuelan government in 2007, during the presidency of Hugo Chávez, when numerous foreign companies from different sectors—especially those linked to energy, oil, and gas—were nationalized.

Over the years, this policy has hampered the development of the Venezuelan oil industry, despite the country's widely recognized economic potential in this sector. Venezuela has the world's largest crude oil reserves, estimated at over 300 billion barrels yet to be extracted. However, a significant portion of this oil is located in offshore fields or deep underground deposits and consists of heavy and extra-heavy crude, making its extraction technically complex and financially costly for state-owned companies....

https://www.wired.com/story/what-happens-next-in-venezuela-and-the-rest-of-latin-america/

[Martin68]

16. No shit they're "wary." This is a quagmire waiting to suck in any who dare to venture onto Venezuelan soil.

Even Venezuelans who hated Maduro will be wary about US involvement in their government and oil business.

[TBF]

17. Trump didn't do his homework -

he simply needed a distraction ... and g-d knows what Steven Miller is up to in the background.

Anyhow, being in Houston, what I've heard is that the industry has already lost a lot of money down there. They're not especially eager to jump back in, and this isn't something they are going to rush into without thinking it through because they've got shareholders to answer to. But Trump doesn't care about that.

[highplainsdem]

18. Guardian article on this:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/03/us-oil-trump-venezuela

[Historic NY]

20. They aren't going in to risk their money on a fools errand...

the oil belongs to the country, hence the people, not the US.

El Trumpo thinks they just hook up a hose and pump it on to a tanker.