WASHINGTON, Aug 28 – President Donald Trump said Friday that the United States has reached a sweeping agreement with Venezuela that could give American interests access to 65 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, in a move his administration says could reshape Venezuela’s energy industry and eventually help ease fuel prices in the United States.
Trump announced the agreement in a social media post, describing it as the “biggest oil deal in world history.” He said the agreement was negotiated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez.
The Venezuelan government said the agreement covers the development of 17 oil fields with a proven potential of 65 billion barrels. Officials in Caracas said the project could attract roughly $100 billion in investment into Venezuela’s energy sector and generate more than $209 billion in tax revenue for the Venezuelan government.
Rodríguez said the agreement could play an important role in restoring Venezuela’s economy after years of political turmoil, declining oil production and deteriorating infrastructure.
The proposed arrangement would allow the United States to work with a private operator to establish a new private company responsible for developing the fields, according to a U.S. official familiar with the agreement. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the details and provided information on condition of anonymity.
Under the proposed structure, Rodríguez has granted the new company rights to develop the oil fields for 100 years, the official said. The United States would have an effective 55% share of the company’s output through a combination of ownership rights and the ability to purchase oil at cost.
If the arrangement proceeds as described, the company would become one of the world’s largest corporate holders of proven oil reserves, ranking behind Saudi Aramco, according to the U.S. official.
The agreement represents a dramatic shift in Venezuela’s energy policy. For decades, the country’s oil industry has been dominated by the state, particularly under the socialist governments that followed the rise of former President Hugo Chávez.
Rodríguez moved toward opening the industry to private investment after taking power, signing legislation that allows greater privatization of the oil sector. The policy marked a major departure from a central principle of the political movement that has governed Venezuela for more than two decades.
Trump Faces Pressure as US Fuel Prices Remain High
The oil agreement comes at a politically sensitive moment for Trump, who has faced growing pressure to bring down gasoline prices in the United States.
Average U.S. gasoline prices were around $4.09 a gallon on Friday, according to AAA, compared with about $3.21 a gallon at the same point last year. The increase has become a concern for American consumers and an economic challenge for the administration.
The pressure has intensified as the war involving the United States, Israel and Iran reaches its six-month mark with no clear end in sight. The conflict has disrupted oil flows from the Gulf, particularly through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical global energy route that handled roughly one-fifth of the world’s petroleum shipments before the conflict.
The United States has also drawn down its Strategic Petroleum Reserve to help manage the effects of the disruption. The reserve fell below 300 million barrels in early August, representing a decline of more than 100 million barrels since the beginning of 2026.
Against that backdrop, Trump has presented Venezuelan oil as a potential long-term answer to some of the country’s energy concerns. Rubio said on X that the agreement would bring billions of dollars in private investment to Venezuela and ultimately contribute to lower gasoline prices in the United States.
“This deal is a huge win for both the American and Venezuelan people,” Rubio wrote.
However, the agreement is unlikely to produce a rapid increase in Venezuelan oil supplies. Energy specialists have warned that restoring the country’s damaged production network will require years of work and billions of dollars in investment.
Venezuela’s oil infrastructure has suffered from years of underinvestment, economic instability and declining maintenance. Bringing dormant fields back into production would require repairs to wells, pipelines, processing facilities, ports and other infrastructure needed to move crude from the oil fields to international markets.
There is also uncertainty over whether major American energy companies will be willing to commit large amounts of capital to Venezuela despite the new political and economic arrangements.
Trump previously urged U.S. oil executives to return to Venezuela after his administration removed former President Nicolás Maduro from power. Executives from major companies expressed interest in the country’s enormous reserves, but they also remained cautious because of their previous experiences operating under Venezuela’s government.
Darren Woods, chief executive of ExxonMobil, the largest U.S. oil company, had previously described Venezuela as “un-investable,” reflecting the concerns that have surrounded the country’s investment environment.
Trump has nevertheless argued that his administration has created greater stability in Venezuela and has repeatedly pointed to the country’s vast oil resources as an opportunity for American businesses.
The president has also accused Venezuela of taking U.S. oil interests after Chávez launched a campaign to nationalize hundreds of foreign-owned assets, including properties belonging to American oil companies.
Venezuela’s enormous petroleum reserves are well established. The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that the country has about 303 billion barrels of crude oil in the ground, giving it one of the world’s largest reserves and accounting for roughly 17% of global reserves.
Much of Venezuela’s remaining oil is not undiscovered. Geologists have already mapped large portions of the country’s deposits, meaning the central challenge is not finding the resource but developing the infrastructure and investment needed to extract it efficiently.
Despite its enormous reserves, Venezuela currently produces only around 1% of the world’s oil. Years of declining production and deteriorating facilities have prevented the country from turning its reserves into sustained output on a scale comparable with other major oil producers.
The proposed agreement therefore faces significant practical challenges before its promised economic benefits can materialize.
For Venezuela, the potential investment could provide a major source of revenue and help revive an economy heavily dependent on petroleum. For the United States, greater access to Venezuelan crude could provide an additional source of oil at a time when global energy markets remain vulnerable to geopolitical disruptions.
The agreement also has a significant political dimension. It follows the dramatic removal of Maduro, who was captured during a U.S. military operation ordered by Trump and brought to the United States to face federal charges involving alleged narcoterrorism and drug trafficking.
Maduro remains jailed in the United States and has pleaded not guilty.
Rodríguez’s decision to open Venezuela’s oil sector to private investment has fundamentally altered the environment in which the country’s petroleum industry operates. Whether that change will be enough to attract the scale of capital required remains uncertain.
The immediate impact on American gasoline prices is also expected to be limited. Even if the agreement moves ahead without major delays, rebuilding Venezuela’s oil industry and substantially increasing production would take considerable time.
Under the proposed arrangement, oil produced by the new company would be used in part to replenish the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve and supply the American military, according to the U.S. official familiar with the deal.
For Trump, the agreement offers a potentially powerful economic and political message: that Venezuela’s vast oil wealth can be redirected toward investment, increased production and greater energy security for the United States. For Venezuela, it represents a bet that opening the country’s most valuable industry to American-backed private investment can help finance a broader economic recovery.
The scale of the reserves involved is enormous, but turning those reserves into actual barrels of oil will depend on investment, infrastructure, political stability and the willingness of international energy companies to return to Venezuela. Those factors will determine whether Trump’s announcement ultimately becomes a historic transformation of the global oil market or remains an ambitious agreement whose benefits take years to materialize.