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Petrobras chief executive set to step down

Maria das Graças Foster Maria das Graças Foster , the embattled head of Petrobras , is set to step down to help resolve a crippling corruption scandal at the Brazilian state-owned oil company, sources at the presidential palace in Brasília said.  The sources said they were unable to provide an exact timetable for her departure but indicated it could be as early as the end of this month. President Dilma Rousseff was reported to have met Ms Graças Foster on Tuesday.  A person familiar with the matter said Ms Graças Foster’s position had become “untenable” at Petrobras, which is at the centre of allegations that executives collaborated with politicians, contractors and black market money dealers to cream billions of dollars from the company’s projects in bribes and kickbacks.  A spokesperson for the presidential palace refused to comment on Tuesday.   A close friend of Ms Rousseff, Ms Graças Foster […]

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Venezuela Goes After Private Companies as Shortages Mount

(Bloomberg) — Venezuelan officials arrested a second retail executive in two days, accusing their companies of hoarding goods and fixing prices, as President Nicolas Maduro responds to mounting shortages and the lowest support in two decades. Officials detained the owner of Dia a Dia supermarket chain and took over the company’s stores, National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello told state television last night from one of the 35 occupied shops. On Feb. 1, police detained the chief executive officer of Farmatodo C.A., which runs almost 200 drug stores across Venezuela and Colombia. The collapse of oil revenue has deepened shortages of everything from diapers to sugar in the country that imports almost everything it consumes. Rather than relaxing price controls to boost supply, Maduro has blamed private industry for “waging economic war” against his government. His approval rating fell to 22 percent in December, according to the latest poll made […]

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United Kingdom: Falklands Drilling Program Confirmed

Falkland Oil and Gas Ltd. has mobilized a rig from West Africa to the Falkland Islands for the 2015 drilling program, Merco Press reported Feb. 3, citing company CEO Tim Bushell. The drilling will begin March and will be operated by Premier Oil and Noble Energy. Significant oil and natural gas reserves have been discovered near the Falklands , aggravating disputes over its ownership.  

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Dominican Republic Taps $1.9 Billion to Pay Venezuelan Oil Debt

(Bloomberg) — The Dominican Republic paid off almost all of a $4.1 billion debt owed to Venezuela for years of oil shipments after raising funds through a bond sale last week, Finance Minister Simon Lizardo said. With a discount of more than 50 percent, the government used $1.93 billion to pay off 98 percent of its debt to Venezuela, Lizardo told reporters Thursday in Santo Domingo. The deal will immediately reduce its public debt by about 3.3 percent of gross domestic product, Lizardo said, according to the government’s information service. “In very rare occasions can a country make a transaction of this magnitude,” he said. The agreement was concluded on Jan. 27, according to the Finance Ministry. The Dominican government had accumulated the debt under preferential financing terms afforded to it as a member of Venezuela’s Petrocaribe energy program. Since Petrocaribe was conceived in 2005 by former President Hugo […]

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Oil Cash Waning, Venezuelan Shelves Lie Bare

CARACAS, Venezuela — Mary Noriega heard there would be chicken. She hated being herded “like cattle,” she said, standing for hours in a line of more than 1,500 people hoping to buy food, as soldiers with side arms checked identification cards to make sure no one tried to buy basic items more than once or twice a week. But Ms. Noriega, a laboratory assistant with three children, said she had no choice, ticking off the inventory in her depleted refrigerator: coffee and corn flour. Things had gotten so bad, she said, that she had begun bartering with neighbors to put food on the table. “We always knew that this year would start badly, but I think this is super bad,” Ms. Noriega said. Venezuelans have put up with shortages and long lines for years. But as the price of oil, the country’s main export, has plunged, the situation has […]

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Thousands march in Venezuela over economic crisis, shortages

0 Like Share 0 CARACAS  – Demonstrators against Venezuela’s economic crisis — facing sky-high inflation and shortages of food and consumer goods — took to the streets in their thousands Saturday, banging pots and demanding an end to President Nicolas Maduro’s term. Opposition leaders, fed up with shortages of milk, coffee, sugar, meat, toilet paper, diapers, deodorant and corn meal, and with Maduro’s refusal to overhaul the increasingly state-managed economy, say the elected socialist should go. Ex-lawmaker Maria Corina Machado — who was jailed after deadly riots last year for inciting violence — said Maduro “must step aside now, so the Venezuelan people can stand united again. ” “The government needs to be changed urgently,” Machado argued, at what opposition activists called the “March of Empty Pots. ” She insisted that constitutional order — waiting for Maduro to be voted out — “cannot wait,” even as some marchers chanted, […]

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Where to Buy Gasoline for $0.002 a Gallon, Seriously

Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro told lawmakers last week he’s considering raising gasoline prices. That might be a good idea. It’s been two decades since the government last lifted state-set local prices, the result of politicians’ concern that the move could spark protests like those that swept across the oil-rich nation following an increase in 1989. In the interim, a string of currency devaluations has pushed down the cost in dollar terms to levels that would seem implausible to consumers in other parts of the world, even after the recent oil tumble cut prices at the pump. The CHART OF THE DAY shows it now costs about 0.2 U.S. cent (that’s right; one-fifth of a penny) to buy a gallon of gasoline in Venezuela , based on black-market currency rates. Expressed another way, you can get 482 gallons with just one dollar. That’s enough to drive a Chevrolet Silverado pickup […]

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Brazil’s most populous region facing worst drought in 80 years

Sao Paulo state has received only one third of the rainfall expected in the wet season Related Stories Brazil’s Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira has said the country’s three most populous states are experiencing their worst drought since 1930. The states of Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais must save water, she said after an emergency meeting in the capital, Brasilia. Ms Teixeira described the water crisis as "delicate" and "worrying". Industry and agriculture are expected to be affected, further damaging Brazil’s troubled economy. The drought is also having an impact on energy supplies, with reduced generation from hydroelectric dams. ‘Poor planning’ The BBC’s Julia Carneiro in Rio de Janeiro says Brazil is supposed to be in the middle of its rainy season but there has been scant rainfall in the south-east and the drought shows no sign of abating. The crisis comes at a time of high […]

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IMF: Venezuela wounded by low oil prices

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro faces uphill economic battle as low oil prices take their toll. (UPI Photo/Mohammad Kheirkhah) WASHINGTON, Jan. 22 (UPI) — Venezuela’s economy will decline more than any other in the region as a result of the drop in oil prices, analysis from the International Monetary Fund found. The Central Bank of Venezuela in December said the collapse in oil prices was in part to blame for a 2.3 percent drop in third quarter gross domestic product. That marked three straight quarters of decline for the member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and a formal slip into recession . Oil prices have dropped more than half since June and are down 20 percent since the Central Bank’s announcement. Alejandro Werner, director of the IMF’s Western Hemisphere division, said declining oil prices means a sharp economic downturn for Caracas. "Venezuela’s economy will take the largest hit […]

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