Moscow, February 6 - Neftegaz.RU. Rosneft, which has several upstream projects in Venezuela, does not expect crude production at its joint projects with state-owned PDVSA in the Latin American country to drop in 2019, said Rosneft´s 1st vice president Eric Liron said, Platts reported.
«We don't expect output to drop in 2019 there despite negative trends that are taking part in the country,» Eric Liron said during the company's conference call on 2018 financial & operation results. «We constantly monitor the political and economic situation in Venezuela and view the political instability in the region as a temporary development that has no substantial impact on the existing projects,» he said.
Rosneft and PDVSA are jointly developing five upstream oil projects in Venezuela - PetroVictoria, Petromiranda, Petromonagas, Boqueron and Petroperija. Rosneft's share in the combined output amounted to 3.4 million mt, or around 68,000 b/d, in 2018.
That volume is used for supplies under the prepayment deal between Rosneft and PDVSA, under which the Venezuelan company still owes billions of dollars to Rosneft. Venezuela halved its key debt to Rosneft through 2018, Rosneft said. The debt reduced to $2.3 billion as of December 21, 2018, from $4.6 billion as of the end of 2017, the presentation said.
Rosneft's officials reiterated the company is confident that the debt would be paid in full by the end of the year, in line with the initial schedule. This is despite growing concerns that the political and economic crisis, coupled with US sanctions against PDVSA, would prevent PDVSA from paying debts to its creditors.
«The debt has already reduced to a level that it is no longer significant» said Alexander Krastilevsky, advisor to Rosneft's CEO. «All the payments have been carried out in line with the schedule, there are no delays,» he said, adding that nominations for tanker deliveries in February back this up. «We see that everything will be covered by the end of the year,» he noted.
