For activist hedge fund Elliott Investment Management, Nicolás Maduro’s swift exit comes at an auspicious time, the Wall Street Journal reported. A U.S. judge in November backed a roughly $6 billion bid by Elliott for Citgo Petroleum, the refining firm owned by Venezuela’s state-run company Petróleos de Venezuela, known as PdVSA, in a forced sale to satisfy creditors. Citgo, based in Houston, owns a U.S. network of refineries, pipelines and terminals that some analysts have said could be worth between $11 billion and $13 billion. The deal was controversial in Venezuela.

White House and State Department officials have told U.S. oil executives in recent weeks that they would need to return to Venezuela quickly and invest significant capital in the country to revive the damaged oil industry if they wanted compensation for assets expropriated by Venezuela two decades ago, Reuters reported. In the 2000s, Venezuela expropriated the assets of some international oil companies that declined to give state-run oil company PDVSA increased operational control, as demanded by late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. U.S.

Peru’s government has approved an emergency decree allowing private investment in parts of the state-owned oil company Petroperu, as authorities move to stabilise a firm weighed down by mounting losses and debt, Aljazeera.com reported. President Jose Jeri announced the decision shortly before the beginning of the new year. The measure permits the reorganisation of Petroperu into one or more asset units, opening the door to private participation in key operations. That includes those at the flagship Talara refinery, which recently underwent a $6.5bn upgrade.

Venezuela started shutting wells in a region that holds the world’s largest deposits of oil in the face of a blockade by the Trump administration meant to financially squeeze the nation, Bloomberg News reported. Petroleos de Venezuela SA began shuttering wells in the Orinoco Belt on Dec. 28 as the state-run refiner ran out of storage space and inventory swelled. PDVSA aims to reduce Orinoco Belt production by at least 25% to 500,000 barrels a day, the people said. The decrease represents a 15% cut of Venezuela’s overall output of 1.1 million barrels a day.

Azul has received U.S. bankruptcy judge approval for its chapter 11 plan, clearing the way for a balance-sheet overhaul less than seven months after the Brazilian airline sought court protection, the Wall Street Journal reported. Judge Sean H. Lane of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York approved the largely consensual plan, overruling objections from the U.S. Trustee related to third-party releases, exculpation provisions and certain fees.

Brazilian union Sindipetro-NF, one of the largest representing Petrobras workers, has rejected the most recent proposal by the state-run oil firm to end a 12-day-long strike, it said in a statement on Friday, Reuters reported. Sindipetro-NF represents about 25,000 workers in the oil industry, including ones in Petrobras' offshore oil platforms in the Campos basin, the second-highest for oil production in Brazil.

Brazilian airline Azul SA is the latest in a string of overseas carriers turning to chapter 11 in the US, becoming “bankruptcy tourists” to access legal protections largely out of reach in their home countries, according to a Bloomberg Law commentary. Azul’s bankruptcy plan, approved this month, slashes more than $2 billion in debt and allows it to reject aircraft leases it couldn’t easily shed at home. Other foreign carriers seeking chapter 11 in the US over the past five years include Avianca, LATAM, Grupo Aeroméxico, and, more recently, Brazil’s Gol Linhas Aéreas.

Brazilian budget carrier Azul SA, now backed by United Airlines Holdings Inc. and American Airlines Group Inc., expects a bankruptcy-triggered reduction of debt and a slew of renegotiated aircraft leases to help it generate a profit the next two years, Bloomberg News reported. The airline will refocus growth plans on the domestic market, though it will increase flights to the US to handle strong demand for World Cup soccer matches next summer, Chief Executive Officer John Rodgerson said in an interview. Azul will still accept deliveries of new aircraft from Airbus SE and Embraer SA.

Argentina’s central bank said on Monday that it would allow the peso to move more freely, responding to investors who have demanded President Javier Milei’s government correct an overvalued currency, the Wall Street Journal reported. Milei’s administration now lets the peso sell freely within a band with upper and lower limits, rather than allowing it to float as the U.S. and other countries permit with their currencies. Beginning next year, the new policy will allow the band to expand at the rate of monthly inflation, which was 2.5% in November, the central bank said.

Bankruptcy Judge Sean Lane on Friday approved Azul’s ‍debt restructuring, allowing the Brazilian airline to cut more than $2 billion in debt and raise capital through a new equity rights ‌offering and investment from ‌American Airlines and United Airlines, Reuters reported. Azul filed for chapter 11 protection ‍in New York ​in May, aiming to ​cut its debt and make ‍its business more resilient to market challenges like fluctuations in fuel prices and currency exchange rates.