Guyana Emerges as the Clear Winner in Venezuela’s Oil Reset

Tsvetana Paraskova

Thu, February 19, 2026 at 9:00 AM GMT+9 4 min read

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One of the biggest winners from the new oil order in Venezuela is its neighbor to the east, Guyana, the country that turned into the newest oil producer in the world thanks to ExxonMobil’s massive oil discoveries.

Since Exxon first found oil in Guyana’s offshore Stabroek block a decade ago, one of the poorest South American countries with fewer than 1 million citizens has turned into an economic powerhouse with double-digit growth since 2019, driven by the oil exports and royalties.

Yet, a century-old territorial dispute with Venezuela and Nicolas Maduro’s threats to annex Guyana’s Essequibo region and boost military and naval presence have accompanied Guyana’s remarkable rise to a significant oil producer with 900,000 barrels per day of crude output.

Maduro’s claims to Essequibo grew louder after Exxon struck billions of barrels of oil offshore Guyana.

With Maduro now out of the picture (and the country), tensions have eased regarding Essequibo.

The dispute over the region is at the International Court of Justice, which could take years to issue a final decision.

But eased tensions and U.S.-compliant Venezuelan leadership could accelerate a potential lifting of the force majeure on about 30% of the Stabroek block, which Exxon and Guyana have imposed due to the territorial dispute.

“One of the unlocks with respect to that region will be the ruling that comes out of the International Court of Justice that’s, you know, the process that Guyana has been going through with Venezuela to align on, you know, the border to resolve the border dispute. So I think that’ll be a critical milestone,” Exxon’s CEO Darren Woods said on the earnings call at the end of January.

“Obviously, with the developments in Venezuela, perhaps we’ll see an opportunity to, with less naval patrols, that’ll make it a little more friendly environment,” the executive added.

“Longer term, we’ll get into that additional acreage and see what the opportunity looks like. We’re pretty optimistic. I think one of the advantages of force majeure is it pauses the clock. And so we will have an opportunity to do what we need to do in that portion of the block when it’s available to us,” Woods noted.

After starting up its fourth project known as Yellowtail last year, the Exxon-led consortium operating Guyana’s Stabroek block hit 900,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil production.

Production capacity from eight developments is expected to reach 1.7 million bpd by 2030.

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The Stabroek co-venturers have so far committed more than US$60 billion to develop seven government-sanctioned projects on Guyana’s offshore Stabroek block. Apart from the four already operational projects, Uaru, Whiptail, and Hammerhead are set to start up by 2029.

An eighth project, Longtail, is currently undergoing regulatory reviews. Once approved, ExxonMobil expects to have total production capacity of 1.7 million bopd from eight developments in Stabroek.

The other U.S. supermajor, Chevron, is now also part of the Guyana oil story as it gained a stake last year after completing the acquisition of Hess Corporation, Exxon’s partner in the Stabroek block with a 30% interest.

Guyana’s offshore oil field is a top-performing asset with the potential to yield even more barrels and billions of U.S. dollars for the project’s partners. Both Chevron and Exxon will benefit from Stabroek even at relatively lower oil prices, because the Guyana block is estimated to have a breakeven oil price of about $30 per barrel.

The country of Guyana will also see benefits from eased tensions with neighboring Venezuela, as investors are likely to factor in lower risks to Guyana’s resource development than prior to Maduro’s ousting.

“If there’s any country that reaps the greatest benefit from Maduro’s removal, I would say it’s probably Guyana,” Henry Ziemer, an associate fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Reuters ahead of the Guyana Energy Conference in Georgetown that started on Tuesday.

At the conference, Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali said the country plans to use its oil riches to boost domestic and regional energy development. Guyana is planning a gas boom, too, to use the associated gas from Exxon’s projects to build up domestic industries, manufacturing, agri-processing, and potentially petrochemicals.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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