UPDATE: Trump relaxes Venezuelan oil embargo, benefiting MAGA billionaire
On Monday, Popular Information reported that the U.S. military raid that removed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro from power could be a financial windfall for Paul Singer, a Trump-supporting billionaire.
Singer, through a company called Amber Energy, purchased Citgo, the U.S. subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-run oil company. The sale of Citgo was forced by creditors, including Singer, after Venezuela defaulted on billions in government-issued bonds.
Citgo owns significant oil refining capacity on the Gulf Coast of the United States and other assets. An advisor to the court that oversaw the sale estimated that Citgo was worth about $13 billion. But Singer was able to purchase Citgo for a substantial discount, $5.9 billion, because those refineries are purpose-built for Venezuelan heavy crude. (The sale still must be approved by U.S. regulators.) The U.S. embargo on Venezuelan oil forced Citgo to purchase oil from more expensive sources in Canada and elsewhere.
The U.S. military operation in Venezuela would benefit Singer if it meant Citgo could acquire Venezuelan oil. Less than a week after the military raid, Venezuelan oil is on its way to the United States. On Tuesday evening, Trump announced on Truth Social that Venezuela would be “turning over” between 30 and 50 million barrels of oil. The heavy crude will be “brought directly to unloading docks in the United States.”
The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump’s announcement was “good news for Gulf Coast refineries that are configured to run heavy crude including from Venezuela.” At the top of that list is Citgo, a company designed to process Venezuelan oil in the U.S. Bloomberg reported on Wednesday that Citgo “may emerge as one of the biggest beneficiaries of President Donald Trump’s plan to bring millions of barrels of the country’s oil to the US.”
Energy Secretary Chris Wright said that the U.S. will control the sale of Venezuelan oil “indefinitely.” That suggests that the flow of oil from Venezuela to the U.S. will continue. Prior to the embargo, Citgo was the largest buyer of Venezuelan oil.
Since Citgo is a privately held company, it’s difficult to assess precisely how the military raid in Venezuela and the return of its oil to the U.S. market may have affected the company’s value.
However, the stock price of Valero, a publicly traded oil company that also has Gulf Coast refining capacity optimized for Venezuelan oil is instructive. Over the last week, Valero’s stock has surged 12%, rising sharply on news of the military raid and again on Trump’s announcement about Venezuelan oil coming to the United States.
On Friday, Trump is scheduled to meet with representatives of the U.S. oil industry at the White House. It is not known whether Paul Singer will be in attendance.
Follow the money. How much of a bribe did Singer pay Trump for this? ANd out new mission is clear - boycott Valero and Citgo gas stations. There is always an alternative nearby so this is an easy one.
"Heather Cox Richardson from Letters from an American" stated today:
"Lisa Desjardins and Nick Schifrin of PBS NewsHour reported this afternoon that Trump administration officials have told lawmakers that they plan to put the money raised from their seizure of Venezuelan oil into bank accounts outside the U.S. Treasury. Desjardins clarified that “[s]ources said they understood these as similar [to] or decidedly ‘off-shore’ accounts.”
Yesterday, Trump announced that, as president of the United States, he would control the money from the sale of Venezuelan oil."
the anger that continues to rise in me is not good for my soul.