“Oil Executives Non-Committal to Trump’s Venezuela Pitch at the White House”, 09 Jan. 2026.

…Trump met with executives from many of the top oil companies in the world Friday to discuss what to do with the country’s huge oil reserves.

Nearly two dozen oil industry CEOs attended…

Trump pitched Venezuela as an opportunity for companies to profit, saying that the companies would have “total security.”

The oil company executives were less enthused.

“If we look at the legal and commercial constructs and frameworks in place today in Venezuela today, it’s uninvestable,” Exxon CEO Darren Woods said in the meeting. “...There has to be durable investment protections, and there has to be a change to the hydrocarbon laws in the country”...

But Woods also did not rule out Exxon’s return to Venezuela...

Executives from Chevron, Exxon, Conoco Phillips, Continental, Halliburton, HKN, Valero, Marathon, Shell, Trafigura, Vitol Americas, Repsol, Eni, Aspect Holdings, Tallgrass, Raisa Energy and Hilcorp were expected to attend the meeting...

Oil companies are reported to be wary of operating in Venezuela, after companies had their assets seized in 2007 when then-President Hugo Chavez nationalized the country’s oil industry…

Trump has said he wants oil companies to invest $100 billion toward the effort…

A spokesperson for the American Petroleum Institute, a trade group representing U.S. oil and gas industry interests, said the industry welcomed the collaboration with the White House, but said investment decisions would be made by individual companies…