Venezuela and Mexico Weigh Oil Price Cuts
The presidents of Mexico and Venezuela, two major oil producers and key suppliers to the United States, met Thursday to consider possible cuts in crude prices as a way to protect their heavily indebted economies.
President Jaime Lusinchi arrived in this Caribbean coastal resort from Caracas, Venezuela, for a one-day visit with President Miguel de la Madrid of Mexico.
Lusinchi raised the possibility that the two countries might lower crude prices. “It’s possible Mexico and Venezuela may be preparing an adjustment of prices. That’s in the perspective,” he said as he left for home.
About half of Mexico’s oil goes to the United States, providing 13% of its neighbor’s oil imports and making it the United States’ biggest foreign supplier.
Roughly 40% of Venezuela’s exports of 1.51 million barrels a day is sold to the United States.
Mario Ramon Beteta, Mexico’s director of the government oil monopoly, Pemex, said in Cancun: “We are studying the new prices right now. . . . We don’t know right now what prices we will set.”
Mexico’s finance secretary, Jesus Silva Herzog, said the purpose of the talks was “to try and buffer the situation which the world oil market is going through and defend the interests of our countries.”
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