Oil prices jumped to two-week highs on Tuesday morning, rising on the back of severe outages in Venezuela and the ongoing production cuts from OPEC+. A devastating electricity blackout swept over Venezuela late last week, crippling daily life for much of the country. PDVSA’s oil exports have been severely disrupted, and while data is scarce, output may have plunged by half to about 500,000 bpd, according to Energy Aspects. “Operations halted at main facilities, reducing output of main synthetic grades and blended Merey to almost zero,” Energy Aspects wrote in a note. “There’s a vicious circle,” the International Energy Agency’s head Fatih Birol told Bloomberg on the sidelines of the IHS CERAWeek Conference in Houston. “Since the oil isn’t exported, there’s not revenue, since there’s not revenue you cannot invest in infrastructure.” The big question is how long the outage will last. The U.S. State Department announced the withdrawal […]