Several European partners of Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA, including Spain’s Repsol, Italy’s ENI and France’s Maurel & Prom, have asked U.S. government for licenses or authorizations to export Venezuelan oil.
The terms requested in the applications are similar to those granted in previous years. Under past arrangements, companies were able not only to receive and export Venezuelan crude for their refineries and other customers, but also to supply fuel to Venezuela through a debt-recovery mechanism.
Background: suspension of licenses
These European firms couldn’t export since the second quarter of last year, when the administration of United States President Donald Trump suspended the existing licenses that previously allowed crude exports from Venezuela.
Repsol attended a meeting at the White House last week, where President Trump encouraged a group of oil companies to invest in Venezuela’s oil sector and revive production and exports.
Wider context: U.S. policy and industry interest
The move by European companies comes as part of a broader shift in U.S. policy toward Venezuelan oil. Washington has indicated it may ease sanctions on Venezuela, which have been in place since 2019, and facilitate renewed commercial activity in the sector.
Other international energy firms, refiners and global trading houses — including U.S.-based companies like Chevron and Valero, India’s Reliance, and traders such as Vitol, Trafigura, Mercuria and Glencore — are also seeking or have received licenses from Washington to resume Venezuelan crude exports. These developments follow a recently agreed 50-million-barrel supply deal between Caracas and Washington, the first step in a larger strategy to reconstruct Venezuela’s oil industry.
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