President Donald Trump’s order to oil company Chevron to stop producing oil in Venezuela means Chevron will no longer be able to be able to collect on debt owed by the country’s state-owned oil company.
Chevron has a more than century-long history operating in the oil-rich South American country for more than a century and produces about a fifth of its oil annually, according to E&E News. Venezuela’s state-run Petróleos de Venezuela SA racked up $3 billion in debt to Chevron through its joint ventures with the American oil company.
On Feb. 26, the Trump Administration announced it would revoke a 2022 license given to Chevron to operate in Venezuela, saying the country’s leader, President Nicolas Maduro, had not met “electoral conditions” and has not been accepting enough Venezuelan migrants deported from the U.S, according to Reuters.
In retaliation, Venezuelan officials said they would stop receiving deportees and reinvest the debt owed to Chevron into local oil companies, Bloomberg reported.