The capture of Nicolás Maduro by Donald Trump’s government to face criminal charges in the United States has raised alarm bells in the corporate world, with oil companies agitated by the eventual opening of operations in Venezuela. So far, only the American Chevron is present, but the Spanish Repsol is one of the most active in the market.
According to the newspaper Expansión, the energy and petrochemical multinational is one of those that invests the most money in Venezuela. At the moment, it has committed around 15,000 million dollars in the country and concentrates a large part of its world oil and gas reserves, and its production in the nation.
According to data from 2024, Repsol’s annual production in Venezuela rose to 24 million barrels of oil equivalent (mbep). Although it is fundamentally gas, the mbep allows gas and crude oil to be equated, to make economic equivalence. At market prices, this production represents more than 1.4 billion dollars.
Repsol’s production in Venezuela remains in that country, among other reasons due to the trade restrictions imposed by the US to export hydrocarbons.
For this reason, the firm has become a key piece of the Venezuelan economy because 33% of all the gas consumed by that country is that extracted by the Spanish oil company.
Despite the geopolitical restrictions that weigh on Venezuela, Repsol’s production has increased in the last three years: 23 mbep in 2023 and 21 mbep in 2022. What’s more, in the first half of 2025, daily production reached 70,500 barrels of oil equivalent, compared to the 65,000 barrels per day on average in the first half of 2024.
Along with Repsol, there are other companies exposed to the conflict. Some of them would be Telefónica, BBVA, Mapfre, Inditex and other tourism companies such as Iberia, Air Europa, Meliá or Hesperia.
