Venezuelan oil firm profits slump 52 percent in 2009

State-owned oil giant Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) said Tuesday its 2009 net profits tumbled 52.2 percent in 2009 to 4.498 billion dollars amid a slide in global crude oil prices. PDVSA said the drop came from a 2008 profit of 9.4 billion dollars - a year when crude oil prices hit record highs before dramatic declines.
In 2009, the average price of a barrel was 57 dollars for exports from Venezuela, which is the largest oil producer in South America and a member of the Opec cartel. That compared with an average 2008 price of 86.49 dollars per barrel. Revenues also took a big hit for the year, slumping 40 percent to 74.996 billion dollars from 126.4 billion in 2008.
PDVSA president Rafael Ramirez told a news conference that "2009 was a difficult year" for the company as it weathered the global financial crisis and huge swings in commodity prices. The company's overall production of crude oil was 3.012 million barrels per day but exports fell to 2.682 million from 2.897 million in 2008. The figures were above the production quota listed from the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries of 2.32 million barrels per day for Venezuela.
PDVSA's debt was listed at 21.4 billion dollars, while its contribution to state coffers fell 42 percent from a year earlier to 32.04 billion dollars. Since 2007, Venezuela has taken at least a 60 percent share in all oil projects in the country, via PDVSA, which has been used by President Hugo Chavez to finance a number of his social programs.
The slumping results for PDVSA is more bad news for an economy mired in deep recession. Venezuela's economy contracted at a 5.8-percent pace in the first quarter in a fourth consecutive contraction. Petroleum exports account for roughly 90 percent of Venezuela's hard currency, and its main buyer is the United States despite major political tensions between the Chavez regime and Washington. Chavez recently threatened to cut off oil supplies to the United States, saying that the United States and Colombia were drawing plans for a possible Colombian military attack on Venezuela amid a diplomatic row between the two South American nations.