When US President Donald Trump ordered the US military to overthrow Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro in early January, he made it clear what his intentions were.
“We’re going to have a presence in Venezuela as it pertains to oil,” Trump said in a press conference on 3 January. “We’re going to be taking a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground.”
Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves of any nation on the planet, though it is only 23rd in the list of oil exporters. Trump's aim has been to increase production in Venezuela in a way that can benefit American consumers and oil companies alike.
Despite these intentions, however, investments from said oil companies have not been as immediately forthcoming as the President would have hoped.
Just a week after the US intervention in Caracas, CEO of ExxonMobil, Darren Woods, described Venezuela as "un-investable", saying that he needed to see "some pretty significant changes" before his company would consider investing in the country.
