Madrid Report Revives Disputed 35% US Stake in Venezuela’s NABEP
Key Facts
Washington’s stake in Venezuelan oil has been described in two incompatible ways since August, by the same government. A Spanish business site restated the larger version on Saturday, without resolving the gap.
Negocios.com, a Madrid business site, said on 26 September that the US government would have a passive 35% stake in NABEP. North American Blue Energy Partners is the Barbados-registered firm at the centre of August’s US-Venezuela oil accord.
Why This Matters Beyond Venezuela
An equity stake would make a US military office a shareholder in a foreign oil producer. That is a different thing from a sanctions licence, a loan guarantee or a supply contract.
It would tie the Department of War’s budget to the commercial fortunes of one company. It would also put that office on the other side of the table from Chevron, a US major.
Venezuela holds the largest proven oil reserves in the world, which is why the question is not academic. For investors, the open issue is whether the structure survives legal and congressional review.
For Caracas, the arrangement is the financial spine of this year’s opening to foreign capital. The Rio Times reported the 35% terms when the White House first published them.
What is new is that the figure is being restated abroad while the Pentagon’s own denial stands. Nobody in Washington has reconciled the two accounts on the record.
What the Madrid Report Says
Negocios.com wrote that NABEP controls rights over 17 oil fields holding about 65 billion barrels. It put the firm’s output at roughly 220,000 barrels a day, against about 280,000 for Chevron.
The piece said the US government “would have the right to a passive 35% stake” while NABEP kept operational control. It added that NABEP could pass Chevron between the end of this year and early next year.
A NABEP spokesman was quoted saying “we are only competing against ourselves”. The same figures and that quote appeared earlier in a Wall Street Journal report on the company.
Negocios.com cites no documents of its own, attributing the stake to information released about the accord. It should therefore be read as a restatement rather than fresh confirmation of the stake.
The Rio Times has set out the 17-field concession and its hundred-year term separately. Neither the Pentagon nor NABEP responded publicly to the Madrid report on Saturday.
The Earlier Report That Points the Other Way
In early September, the US news site Semafor reported that Congress had refused the Pentagon that power. It said lawmakers had declined to pass proposals giving the Office of Strategic Capital authority to buy equity.
A person familiar with the matter told Semafor the office therefore lacks the legal authority to seek such stakes. That account rests on a single unnamed source, and Semafor said the Pentagon and White House did not comment.
It has not been confirmed by any congressional committee on the record. The office was created in 2022 to issue and guarantee loans for firms in critical technologies.
Lending and loan guarantees are not the same instrument as owning a share of a company. Semafor also reported that lawmakers had asked the administration for briefings on the transaction.
Three senior House Democrats had already written to Secretary of State Marco Rubio about the deal. They asked for documents by 1 October, and the administration has no legal duty to answer.
Two Official Versions, Side by Side
The White House described the arrangement in plain terms when it published the accord. Just Security, a legal publication at New York University, quoted that text in its analysis.
It said NABEP had granted the Office of Strategic Capital a 35% equity stake in its corporate parent. The Daily Caller, reporting the same announcement, said the office would own 35% of the venture.
The Pentagon’s chief spokesman, Sean Parnell, told Reuters in August that the office takes no equity positions. He described its mandate as lending, guaranteeing and technical or transaction structuring support.
Just Security’s authors, Kate Brannen and Tess Bridgeman, set the two statements against each other. They asked whether the office has the legal authority to hold such a stake at all.
Neither side has published the signed documents that would settle the point. Both versions therefore stand as official statements that contradict each other.
What Was Actually Announced in August
President Donald Trump announced the accord on 28 August over more than 65 billion barrels of reserves. The White House published a fact sheet with the terms on 31 August, three days later.
Under those terms the State Department may buy 20% of output at cost, with first refusal on the rest. The White House said the arrangement costs the United States nothing and carries a veto over board appointments.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended the accord, saying it displaced Chinese and Russian interests. Trump said the benefits might take time, adding that two years would be a short period.
Senator Jack Reed, the senior Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, called it an abuse of power. He said turning the US military into an investor in Venezuelan oil misused taxpayer money.
NABEP is led by Alejandro Betancourt, a Venezuelan businessman who has faced money-laundering investigations in Europe. He has not been convicted, Rubio says no US investigation is open, and The Rio Times has covered the objections.
The Numbers, and Where Chevron Stands
The gap between the two producers is about 60,000 barrels a day on the figures reported. The Wall Street Journal reported that NABEP aims to add roughly 180,000 barrels a day next year.
It put the company’s 2028 target at 500,000 barrels a day. The paper reported that NABEP had assembled 60 drilling rigs and 30 steam generators for the work.
The Wall Street Journal reported Chevron plans about US$7 billion of Venezuelan investment over five years. The same paper put Chevron’s long-run ambition at about 600,000 barrels a day.
Chevron executives have privately complained about competing with a government-backed rival, the Journal reported. Some industry figures doubt NABEP can add barrels at the pace announced.
Venezuela‘s wider problem is surface infrastructure rather than reserves underground. Pipelines, treatment plants, diluent supply and electricity all constrain how fast heavy crude can move.
What It Means If You Invest, Trade or Work in the Sector
Holders of Chevron stock now face a competitor whose main shareholder may be a US government office. That is a political risk rather than an operational one, and it is hard to hedge.
Service companies weighing Venezuelan contracts should read the counterparty carefully before signing. If the stake is later found to lack authority, the ownership of the parent could change.
Lenders will want to see the signed documents rather than the published summaries. Traders should note that the offtake right sits with the State Department, not with the Pentagon.
Anyone modelling Venezuelan supply should treat the 2028 target as a company statement, not a forecast. The near-term figures to watch are monthly output and rig counts, which are published irregularly.
For staff on the ground, the practical constraint remains power and logistics. Those have not improved with the change of ownership on paper.
What Is Not Yet Known
The signed agreement between the United States and NABEP has not been published. It is not known whether the stake takes the form of shares, warrants or an option.
No congressional committee has stated on the record whether the office may hold equity. The Pentagon has not withdrawn or amended Parnell’s August statement.
The White House has not amended its own description either. It is unclear who will sit on the board of the joint venture, a question Just Security raised.
Neither NABEP nor the administration has confirmed the production figures independently. Chevron has not commented publicly on the comparison with NABEP’s output.
No date has been set for the briefings that lawmakers requested. Until documents appear, both accounts of the stake remain reported claims rather than settled facts.
Frequently Asked Questions
What did Negocios.com actually report?
It said on 26 September that the US government would have a passive 35% stake while NABEP keeps operational control. The figures it uses match an earlier Wall Street Journal report.
Why is that disputed?
Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in August that the Office of Strategic Capital does not take equity positions in private companies. Semafor later reported that Congress had declined to grant it that power.
Has anyone reconciled the two versions?
No. The White House text says NABEP granted the office a 35% equity stake, and that text has not been amended or withdrawn.
Is NABEP really about to overtake Chevron?
That is the company’s own projection, reported by the Wall Street Journal and restated in Madrid. Chevron currently produces more, and no independent audit of either figure has been published.
Sources: Negocios.com, the 26 September report, Semafor, Congress and the Pentagon’s equity power, Just Security, questions for Congress on the stake, Discovery Alert, the Pentagon’s denial to Reuters, The Daily Caller, the White House terms, El Nacional, the Semafor account in Spanish, Aporrea, the Wall Street Journal figures on NABEP, Diario Las Americas, the disputed stake in Spanish
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