The supermajors mostly stayed out of Venezuela’s reopening. The companies that moved first were smaller, and pulling them in has been a big part of Alejandro Betancourt López’s job.
Why the Small Firms Moved First
The large American oil companies had reasons to hesitate. Venezuela’s past made them cautious, and its crude is heavy and sour, expensive to refine, so they mostly watched. Betancourt worked the other end of the market, courting the independents and wildcatters ready to move now, and helped the administration find the assets worth chasing.
Smaller firms bite where the giants won’t because the math is different. A small operator can pick one field, sign, and be working it within months, where a supermajor spends a year in committees before a single rig moves. Betancourt’s own preliminary deals came together with Lionheart Capital and Pacific Coast Energy Co., with PCEC signed to operate fields in Lake Maracaibo and the Orinoco Belt.
Who’s on the List
The wider roster runs deeper. When oil companies were summoned to the White House to talk Venezuela back in January, the list reached well past the majors to a set of independents, among them Continental Resources, HKN Inc, Raisa Energy, Tallgrass Energy, and Aspect Holdings. Several carry Denver ties, home turf of Energy Secretary Chris Wright.
These are mid-sized operators, used to squeezing production out of difficult, mature wells, which is close to what Venezuela’s run-down fields need. For a small firm, one productive Venezuelan field can add more reserves than its entire existing book.
Betancourt is the buffer that makes the bet workable. He can tell a newcomer which wells still have life in them and which contracts are solid, so a small board can say yes to a country it would otherwise avoid. The majors are circling back now, but the independents got in early, and the operator who opened the door for them is Alejandro Betancourt López.
The reopening was designed to pull these firms in, and the acreage they’re eyeing runs through the fields NABEP now leads. For a mid-sized operator, drilling next to the biggest private producer in the country beats going it alone in unfamiliar territory. The majors have the capital to move at scale once they commit, but the independents got in first, into fields that were sitting idle, on terms set before the crowd arrived. The door they walked through was opened by Betancourt.
