- FISCAL
The Treasury Secretary gave his annual testimony on the financial system without naming the country whose oil money his department holds, and in the question round he put no figure on it either.
Declaración preparada de 648 palabras · Venezuela, cero menciones · preguntado por los flujos, no dio el monto acumulado ni el destino
affects anyone collecting or paying for a Venezuelan resource who wants to audit where that money ends up, and a country that expected from the United States the standard of transparency it never had at home
- ENERGIA
Continental Resources signed a memorandum with PDVSA over the Ayacucho 2 block and puts the production participation contract in the coming weeks.
126.000 acres en Anzoátegui · memorando, no contrato · el cien por ciento del interés de trabajo solo nace al firmarse
affects the oilfield services supplier sizing rig and staffing demand in the Belt
- INSTITUCIONAL
A month after both delegations agreed to claim the 31 tonnes at the Bank of England, the head of one of them met at the Foreign Office. He came back saying there had been good news, without saying what.
Acuerdo de la mesa del 12-ago sobre el oro de Londres · reunión en el Foreign Office el 15-sep · ronda desde el jueves 17
affects anyone conditioning an entry decision on the negotiation producing verifiable rules
Venezuela has never sold this much crude to the United States: 782,000 barrels a day in the week to September 11, the year's high and the twenty-first straight ahead of Saudi Arabia. That side can be counted, it comes out every Wednesday and anyone can rebuild it. The other cannot. What those cargoes pay a blocked person enters, as a condition of the license, a Treasury account, and so do royalties and levies. On Tuesday the custodian of that account appeared before Congress and did not give the balance. The asymmetry is not an oversight: the order authorizes reports to Congress rather than requiring them, and the statutes it invokes ask for spending and actions, never how much is there. A reporting rule that can be met in full without producing a number is not a reporting rule. And that is precisely the figure Venezuela has spent a quarter of a century asking someone to publish. The arrangement that shields the revenue did not fix the opacity it came from: it moved it to another country.
That is 183,000 barrels a day more than the previous week and the highest reading since the series picked up the recovery. Worth saying what it measures and what it does not: crude arriving at U.S. ports, not total Venezuelan exports, and the weekly reading is preliminary and gets revised. The order of magnitude holds anyway. The 2026 average runs at 438,000 barrels a day over thirty-seven weeks, so last week sat almost eighty percent above its own year. The streak began in late April, when Saudi Arabia posted 515 against 499 and lost second place. It has not taken it back.
Bessent filed his annual testimony to the Financial Services Committee on Tuesday. It runs 648 words and Venezuela appears in none of them. The oil fund came up in the question round and left without a figure.
The Treasury Secretary appeared on Tuesday before the House Financial Services Committee for his annual testimony on the international financial system. The prepared statement his department published covers the G20 ministerial, the Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the campaign against Iran. Venezuela does not figure. Nor does gold or sanctions. The country came up when Representative Sean Casten asked about the flows, and the Secretary did not confirm the accumulated amount. He had been asked before: in April four legislators sought an audit of the scheme from the congressional watchdog, and the bill that would compel reporting has sat in committee since March.
Departamento del Tesoro de EE. UU. ↗Declaración preparada: 648 palabras · Venezuela 0 · oro 0 · sanciones 0 · América Latina 0 · Irán 2 · G20 2 · FMI 1 · Banco Mundial 1What holds up that power is not force. Crude sells in dollars and dollars clear through U.S. banks: every transaction needs permission. Caracas accepts the key in exchange for something — the same order shields the money from creditors with judgments. What does not add up is how the burden is split. The same regime requires a private company moving a cargo to report within 10 days and every 90 thereafter: counterparties, volumes, prices and what was paid to the Venezuelan treasury. It requires the custodian of the account to report not once.
The U.S. supplier the account pays: supply is authorized only from the United States, so the fund's operating spend returns to that supplier's billing.
The creditor with a final judgment, which is the order's declared purpose and not a side effect. And the Venezuelan who wants to audit what did arrive: his own government's portal has shown zero since March.
INDICADORA published quarterly report from the auditor contracted by the State Department, a Treasury rule in the Federal Register, or an official balance figure for the account. · Antes del cierre del tercer trimestre de 2026, el 30 de septiembre
Harold Hamm's producer announced a memorandum with PDVSA on Wednesday over 126,000 acres north of the Orinoco. It would operate alone, at one hundred percent. The contract that would make it real is left for the coming weeks.
Continental Resources announced on Wednesday the signing of a memorandum of understanding with Petroleos de Venezuela to operate and develop the Ayacucho 2 block in Anzoategui, north of the Orinoco river. It covers some 126,000 acres with an estimated 30 billion barrels of resource in place. Only on execution of the production participation contract would the company operate with one hundred percent of the working interest. Doug Lawler leads it and Harold Hamm founded it. The release credits the opening to the U.S. administration's call and to the revised hydrocarbons legal framework.
Continental Resources ↗Ayacucho 2, Anzoátegui · ~126.000 acres · 30.000 MMbbl de recurso en sitio · 100% de interés de trabajo al ejecutarse el CPP · Doug Lawler presidente ejecutivo · Harold Hamm fundadorThe two figures in the announcement are smaller than they look. Resource in place measures the size of the deposit, not what would come out of it, and a memorandum commits no dollar: the hundred percent working interest does not exist until the definitive instrument is signed. What is fixed from today is where the money will go once it exists. January's order gave the proceeds from the sale of Venezuelan natural resources a destination before the first barrel exists, and the sanctions office's frequently asked questions added royalties, per-barrel levies and federal taxes.
Continental, which ties up 126,000 acres without putting in capital: the memorandum requires no investment until there is a contract, and meanwhile nobody else negotiates that block.
PDVSA, which on execution cedes the whole operatorship and all of the working interest, and whose income from that crude will not pass through its own till but through the account the U.S. Treasury administers.
INDICADORThe appearance of a signed production participation contract, with investment amount and term stated by the company. · Las próximas semanas, que es el plazo que la propia compañía declaró el 16 de septiembre
On August 12 both delegations agreed to go after the 31 tonnes London has held since 2019. On Tuesday the head of one was at the Foreign Office with the foreign minister. Thursday the round starts and the other waits in Caracas.
On August 12 the dialogue table agreed to promote recovery of Venezuela's reserve assets at the Bank of England: 31 tonnes deposited in 2008 and frozen since 2019. On Tuesday the 15th, Jorge Rodriguez and Foreign Minister Felix Plasencia met in the United Kingdom with Harriet Thompson, the Foreign Office's director for the Americas, and reported it themselves by video. Rodriguez presides over the National Assembly, heads the government delegation and is the acting president's brother. The opposition delegation led by Dinorah Figuera arrived in Caracas this week for Thursday's round.
Asamblea Nacional y Cancillería de Venezuela — vía Runrunes ↗Acuerdo de la mesa del 12-ago sobre los activos en el Banco de Inglaterra · 31 toneladas depositadas en 2008, congeladas desde 2019 · reunión en el FCDO el 15-sep · ronda desde el 17-sepThe sequence is in plain sight and every piece is dated. On August 12 the table agreed to promote recovery of the Venezuelan assets held at the Bank of England. On September 15 the head of one of the two delegations was meeting at the Foreign Office, and that same day London announced it was raising its representation to ambassador. What the delegation reported on returning was three subjects — the country's situation, the productive apparatus and how the table is going — and one sentence: that there had been good news, without saying what. If the gold was on that table, neither capital has put it in writing.
The government delegation, which opens its own channel with London over a process it also chairs, without the counterpart in the room or any record of it being briefed.
The opposition delegation, arriving Thursday to discuss courts and guarantees after the other side told London, on its own, how that same table is going.
INDICADORWhether Thursday's round closes with a document signed by both delegations, and whether the August 12 mandate on the Bank of England assets produces any filing in the English case. · El cierre de la ronda que arranca el jueves 17 de septiembre de 2026
HOW OUR CALLS ARE DOING
indicators we issued in earlier editionsOn September 15 we set a watch on which would be the first contract signed under license 52C and what office would be held by whoever signed it for the state company.
A memorandum arrived, not a contract. Continental Resources signed an understanding with PDVSA on Wednesday over Ayacucho 2 and placed the production participation contract in the coming weeks, so the indicator is still waiting for the first binding instrument and the office held by whoever signs for the state company.