"International oil companies push for quick reforms in Venezuela to give them control over oil exports", 16 January 2026

...Oil executives and lawyers for international oil companies are lobbying the U.S. and Venezuelan governments for changes in the OPEC member's hydrocarbon law that would give them the right to freely export the oil they produce in Venezuela, sources involved in the talks said. As the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump works to convince energy companies to start work quickly on his $100 billion reconstruction plan for Venezuela's dilapidated oil industry, many potential investors are trying to figure out how to make that happen without spending years waiting for legal and contractual reforms that would protect their investments.

To get things moving, representatives of international oil companies are seeking a few modifications to the existing legal framework for the industry that would leave state-run oil giant PDVSA as the majority stakeholder of all oil joint ventures, but would grant foreign partners control of their share of production and give them access to the company's oil terminals and export infrastructure to facilitate shipments.

That would be a change from the existing law, which states oil produced must be controlled by PDVSA...

International oil companies are also seeking to remove extra taxes introduced by the government after the law was approved in 2021, only preserving royalties and income tax, the people said. The tax reform would lead to a smaller government take of the value of the oil produced...