Venezuela exports slump as Maduro capture set to alter tanker patterns
VENEZUELA’s seaborne crude exports slumped in December as escalating US interdiction risks choked off long-haul “shadow” flows to Asia, setting the stage for a volatile start to 2026 in which the capture of President Nicolás Maduro could reshape tanker demand patterns.
Seaborne exports fell 36% month on month to just under 600,000 barrels per day, according to energy and freight analytics platform Vortexa.
The December fall reflected a breakdown in export execution rather than upstream supply availability, Vortexa analyst Claire Jungman wrote in report.
“As the US ‘Operation Southern Spear’ blockade intensified, tanker operators servicing the sanctioned trade to China faced increased seizure risk, leading to a wave of vessel mid-voyage U-turns and delayed departures.”
Licensed US exports by Chevron remained comparatively resilient at approximately 100,000 bpd, accounting for roughly 18% of December’s total and anchoring what remained of Venezuela’s outbound trade.
Signs of the blockade’s effectiveness emerged before Maduro’s capture over the weekend.
A Chinese-flagged very large crude carrier, Thousand Sunny (IMO: 9623269), which had been on course to load Venezuelan crude in defiance of the blockade appeared to have already diverted to Nigeria, according to Lloyd’s List Intelligence vessel tracking data.
The apparent course change came as the US Treasury Department announced its latest round of designations on December 31, sanctioning four companies with registered addresses in mainland China, Hong Kong, and the Marshall Islands, and identifying four associated oil tankers as blocked property.
As interdiction risks intensified, at least 15 million barrels of crude were forced into floating storage, with PDVSA reportedly resorting to “extreme solutions”— including diverting residual fuels to waste handling systems — to prevent a total shutdown of the Paraguaná Refining Center.
The capture and removal of Maduro, alongside President Trump’s statement that the US will “run” Venezuela until a peaceful transition, has injected fresh uncertainty into the market. On Sunday, Acting President Delcy Rodríguez struck a conciliatory tone, inviting Washington to collaborate on “an agenda of co-operation” and expressing Venezuela’s aspiration to “live without external threats.”
A peaceful transition to a US-friendly government would likely lead to the repeal of Washington’s sanctions, offering Venezuela’s oil sector a reprieve and fundamentally redrawing global trade flows.
Tanker market implications
For tanker markets, the immediate question is less about production — widely viewed as a multi-year recovery story even under improved political backing — and more about trade execution and routing.
Equity analysts are already gaming out the implications for freight and tanker stocks.
“The developments should be supportive of tanker markets,” Fearnley Securities wrote in a note.
The brokerage outlined two likely paths: either export conditions for Venezuelan oil worsen further under a status quo, pushing volumes onto compliant tonnage and away from shadow fleet* tankers; or the US increases control of Venezuelan production, routing more crude to Gulf Coast refineries equipped to process the country’s extra-heavy grades.
Under the latter scenario, Fearnley noted that Venezuelan crude heading to the US would likely be transported by aframax tankers, creating demand for such vessels in the Atlantic. The shift could also widen the West-East arbitrage as more Atlantic volumes become available for regular trade, supporting VLCC tonne-miles over time.
Shanghai-based SWS Research noted that if sanctions are lifted and Venezuelan exports pivot away from China toward the US and Europe, compliant VLCC demand could rise by approximately 1.4% in volume terms and 2.1% in tonne-mile terms, while compliant aframax demand could increase by around 4%.
China and India would need to source replacement barrels from the Middle East and elsewhere, potentially generating additional tonne-mile demand.
Pareto Securities, however, struck a more cautious tone, arguing that the impact on VLCCs would be limited given that 80% of Venezuelan oil currently goes to China via inefficient routing.
“Any positive impact of a more open and legitimate trade — boosting demand for ‘clean’ VLCCs — should be relatively modest,” the broker wrote, though it added that sanctioned ships are likely to continue struggling and scrapping activity may increase.
Jungman said that near-term focus will remain on shipping behaviour and export clearance, with floating storage levels providing the clearest signal of when Venezuelan barrels re-enter the market.
She expects any initial risk premium to fade unless Washington provides concrete policy clarity, most importantly formal Ofac authorisations specifying what transactions are permitted.
The path to higher production, however, remains a multi-year project.
Vortexa cautioned that even with improved political backing and potential Western re-entry, sustained investment and operational rebuilding would be required before Venezuela can deliver durably higher supply.
Fearnley suggested production could rise by 500,000-600,000 bpd to around 1.5 million bpd “relatively quickly under the right conditions,” but output approaching 2 million bpd would take years given the complicated nature of the heavy crude.
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