US President Trump wants to clean house in Venezuela. Is he targeting the country's oil reserves, as his Colombian counterpart Petro claims, and does he want Maduro to step down? Whether he's targeting drug crime is questionable, as the country isn't exactly the most important South American drug production and trafficking hub. Regardless, despite the tensions, the oil price remains under pressure.
At the time of writing (Tuesday afternoon, December 2nd), the Brent crude price is $62,95 per barrel. Last Wednesday (November 26th), oil cost $63,13 per barrel.
The eight OPEC+ countries (Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the UAE, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria, and Oman) maintained their decision to pause production increases for the entire first quarter of 2026 at their meeting on Sunday, November 30. The market sees this as confirmation that OPEC is also concerned about overproduction.
Meanwhile, tensions between Trump and Venezuela are rising. After several suspected drug boats (and their crews) were previously shot down, Trump has now declared Venezuela's airspace closed. As a precaution, KLM is no longer flying over Venezuela's airspace, which is close to Bonaire (a special Dutch municipality) and Curaçao.
There's speculation that Trump wants Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro ousted, but oil from the country with the world's largest reserves also seems to be a factor. The president of neighboring Colombia, Gustavo Petro, claimed in an interview with CNN that oil is "the heart of the matter." "He's not thinking about the democratization of Venezuela, let alone the drug trade," Petro said.
On Sunday, Venezuela asked OPEC+ for support in its fight against the US. According to officials in the capital, Caracas, this poses a threat to the stability of Venezuelan oil production and global energy security.
The prospect of a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine—and the lifting of sanctions on Russian oil—is keeping oil prices in check. However, there's little sign of an impending ceasefire.
The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) shut down a Russian export terminal on the Black Sea on Saturday after it was damaged by Ukrainian drones. CPC transports oil from three major Kazakh oil fields. In 2024, transshipment volumes totaled approximately 63 million tons of oil, of which about 74% came from foreign carriers, including Chevron, ExxonMobil, and Shell, according to a press release from CPC (to emphasize that Russian interests are not necessarily affected).
On Friday and Saturday, two oil tankers from the Russian shadow fleet (ships that sail under a different flag to avoid sanctions) were also hit by suspected Ukrainian drones off the coast of Turkey.
Diesel is falling in price
Diesel is falling in price. Last Wednesday (November 26), diesel cost €128,78 per 100 liters (from 4.000 liters), according to LTO data. On Tuesday afternoon, it was €126,63 per 100 liters.
Gas price continues to fall
Last Wednesday, the gas price also reached its lowest point in eighteen months, at €29,50 per MWh on the TTF gas futures market. Since then, the price has fallen even further, dropping to €27,69 per MWh. For that price, we have to go back to the first week of April 2024. European gas reserves are below average, but there is ample availability of American LNG.
Until the weekend, gas demand will be about the same as last week, but on Saturday and Sunday it will be lower than last weekend. It will also be slightly warmer.
Electricity price stable
From November 27th to December 2nd, there were few fluctuations in the daily average on the European Power Exchange (Epex Spot). The highest point was €87,59 per MWH and the lowest €81,24.
Next Thursday, a lot of solar energy will be generated, according to the National Energy Dashboard's energy forecast, but the rest of the week will be around the three-year average. The wind will be above average this week, especially on Saturday.
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