Venezuelan Oil Shipments to India Increase 50 Percent

Venezuelan oil shipments to India rose roughly 50 percent in the most recent quarter, making Venezuela India's third-largest crude supplier behind Russia and the United Arab Emirates. The increase followed the blockage of approximately 40 percent of India's usual crude supply through the Strait of Hormuz.

The Trump administration now controls Venezuela's estimated 303 billion barrels of proven reserves following the capture and removal of Maduro in January. The administration is actively pushing Venezuelan crude back onto global markets.

Infrastructure rot threatens to cap any Venezuelan oil recovery. The scale of investment needed casts a long shadow over post-Maduro economic hopes, even as Washington tries to use the sector as a geopolitical tool. Asian nations are scrambling to find new oil and gas suppliers as the Iran war stretches on and negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz remain murky at best.

Asia, the primary purchaser of oil and gas supplies out of the Gulf, has been hit hardest by the sudden blockage of approximately one-fifth of the world's crude trade. Energy prices are soaring throughout the region, and global oil reserves are running dangerously low.