Matthew Smith is Oilprice.com's Latin-America correspondent. Matthew is a veteran investor and investment management professional. He obtained a Master of Law degree and is currently located in Latin America. Matthew writes on oil and gas, mining and infrastructure.
After entering office on August 7th, 2023, Colombia’s leftist President, Gustavo Petr, implemented his plan to cease issuing new hydrocarbon exploration contracts and ban the controversial…
South American microstate Guyana recently emerged as what is being described as the world’s hottest offshore frontier oil play. A consortium led by ExxonMobil controls Guyana’s…
South America is fast emerging, once again, as one of the world’s hottest drilling locations, with the continent believed to contain considerable volumes of commercially…
A sharp decline in energy sector investment and a lack of world-class hydrocarbon discoveries is threatening strife-torn Colombia with an energy crisis. Natural gas shortages…
Despite strict U.S. sanctions implemented by former President Donald Trump in January 2019 that cut Venezuela off from global energy and capital markets, the country’s…
In a mere four years, Guyana went from first discovery to first oil, a rapid timeframe in an industry where it can take years to…
In a surprise development, there are indications that the economically strife-torn country of Argentina will emerge as a major regional energy player. The exploitation of…
Despite financial markets being roiled by leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s, known as Lula, October 2022 electoral victory, there are signs that Brazil’s president…
Surging petroleum theft is weighing on Colombia’s beaten-down oil industry, which is beset by geopolitical headwinds on all sides. While attacks on energy infrastructure in the strife-torn…
Ecuador, once an island of peace in the strife-torn Northern Andean region of South America, is caught in the midst of drug-fueled violence, which is…
Suriname’s President Chan Santokhi had pinned his hopes on a massive oil boom to reinvigorate the former Dutch colony’s crisis-prone economy. Those hopes were dashed…
Argentina’s shale oil and gas boom is gaining momentum despite the political and economic dysfunction engulfing Latin America’s third-largest economy. There are signs that Argentina…
Tiny Guyana, a former British colony in South America of less than one million, is on the cusp of becoming a major global oil exporter.…
Cocaine-fueled violence is sweeping across the tiny South American country of Ecuador. The crisis-prone Andean country of less than 20 million, which enjoyed a massive…
Colombia’s beaten-down oil industry is struggling to recover from the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, with the tempo of operations and production lower than in 2019. The 2022 electoral…
Lake Maracaibo, which is South America’s oldest lake and forms part of a crucial regional ecosystem, is dying. The five thousand square miles ecologically diverse…
After five commercial oil discoveries in Surname’s offshore Block 58, the government in Paramaribo was optimistic the tiny, impoverished country was on track to enjoy…
A 2005 to 2015 oil boom under the stewardship of leftist President Rafael Correa pulled Ecuador, one of South America’s poorest countries, out of poverty.…
Surging cocaine production, which hit yet another annual record during 2021, makes Colombia the world’s top supplier of the illicit narcotic. The vast profits generated by…
The near collapse of Venezuela’s once colossal oil industry under the weight of endemic corruption‚ and strict U.S. sanctions, along with Mexico’s sputtering mature oil fields, saw…