The value and timing of any ExxonMobil return to Venezuela were not disclosed after the country signed a memorandum with the U.S. oil company, MercoPress reported Tuesday.
Acting President Delcy Rodríguez and Dan Ammann, ExxonMobil's upstream president, attended the signing in Caracas on Monday, MercoPress reported. The outlet said the memorandum is not a contract and disclosed no proposed investment sum or timetable.
Rodríguez said the agreement covers fields producing oil now as well as areas awaiting development. She hoped it would lead to agreements soon. Rodríguez also cited reserves of billions of barrels and said ExxonMobil had “the capacity, technology and investment needed,” MercoPress reported.
Ammann said ExxonMobil’s capabilities, Venezuela’s resources and the country’s oil and gas history could bring benefits to all parties. He described the memorandum as a possible starting point for the company’s return, according to the outlet.
The signing follows a hydrocarbons-law reform that opened Venezuela’s energy sector to private and foreign investment, MercoPress reported. EconoTimes previously covered how the law lets Venezuela-based firms take on upstream work. Under the law, companies bear the costs and risks of their operations, while the state retains ownership of hydrocarbon deposits.
MercoPress placed the memorandum in a wider policy push. It reported that U.S. President Donald Trump has urged energy companies to invest in Venezuela since former President Nicolás Maduro was removed from power in a U.S. military operation on Jan. 3, 2026. Rodríguez also reported meetings with ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips in April after the legal reform, the outlet said.
ExxonMobil left Venezuela in 2007 after Hugo Chávez’s government nationalized the last privately held oilfields, MercoPress reported. The outlet also recalled that Rodríguez, then Maduro’s vice president, accused ExxonMobil in March 2025 of conspiring against Venezuela. MercoPress gave no date for a follow-up agreement or investment decision.
