CARACAS: Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA’s inventories of its main export crude grade dipped this week to their lowest levels since late November, internal company documents seen by Reuters showed.

Merey 16 stocks at the country’s main oil terminal, the Jose port, fell to 4.85 million barrels as of Jan. 25, down from 9 million barrels on Dec. 21. The drop came as exports by Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) and its joint ventures rise despite US sanctions on the company, as little-known firms have replaced traditional buyers.

High inventories at Jose have consistently been a constraint on PDVSA’s crude output since the sanctions were imposed in January 2019, often forcing the company to shut blending and upgrading activities at plants near the terminal as well as crude extraction further upstream. The decline in stocks this month has allowed PDVSA to boost oil blending and upgrading - necessary to convert extra-heavy crude from the Orinoco belt into exportable grades - to 247,000 barrels per day (bpd) on Jan. 25 and 276,000 bpd on Jan. 21, the documents showed.