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(Reuters) – The Trump administration on Thursday eased some sanctions on the Venezuelan oil industry as it seeks to expand production there after U.S. forces ousted the South American country’s President Nicolas Maduro on January 3.
The U.S. Treasury issued a general license authorizing transactions involving the government of Venezuela and state oil company PDVSA that are “ordinarily incident and necessary to the lifting, exportation, reexportation, sale, resale, supply, storage, marketing, purchase, delivery, or transportation of Venezuelan-origin oil, including the refining of such oil, by an established U.S. entity.”
The decision to issue a general license marks a shift from a previous plan to grant individual exemptions to sanctions for companies seeking to do business in the country.
Following the U.S. capture of Maduro, U.S. officials have said Washington would ease sanctions imposed on Venezuela’s energy industry.
The administration of President Donald Trump is pursuing an ambitious $100 billion reconstruction plan for the country’s oil industry, and intends to manage the oil sales “indefinitely.”
As part of that effort, the U.S. and Caracas reached an initial $2 billion deal in January to export Venezuelan crude oil, including to U.S. refiners.
Oil producers Chevron, Repsol and ENI, refiner Reliance Industries, and some U.S. oil service providers have sought licenses in recent weeks to expand output or exports from the OPEC member.
The companies are partners and customers of state oil company PDVSA.
The large number of individual requests to the U.S. government had delayed progress on plans to expand exports and get investment moving quickly into Venezuela, two sources said this week.
Reporting by Reporting by Timothy Gardner, Marianna Parraga, Christian Martinez and Daphne Psaledakis; Editing by Rod Nickel and David Ljunggren
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