ConocoPhillips Sends Team to Venezuela to Evaluate Oil Prospects

ConocoPhillips has dispatched a team to Venezuela to evaluate the prospects for a return to drilling in the oil-rich Caribbean nation almost two decades after billions of dollars in assets were seized by the socialist regime.

The undertaking makes ConocoPhillips just the second major US oil company to publicly disclosed an on-the-ground inspection in Venezuela, home to some of the world’s biggest crude reserves.

The purpose of the trip is to “better understand the potential for in-country oil and gas opportunities,” Dennis Nuss, a spokesman, said in a statement on Thursday. “We will evaluate Venezuela against other international opportunities as ...