U.S. received $12 billion in Venezuelan oil revenues, secret report shows

The U.S. government received and disbursed more than $12 billion in revenue from Venezuela’s natural resource exports in the first nine months of this year, according to a confidential report by global financial services firm KPMG.

The report, which was reviewed by the New York Times, provides the most detailed portrait so far of the financial control exerted by the U.S. government on Venezuela since U.S. forces toppled the country’s president in January.

The Trump administration installed a pliant interim government and charged it with opening up Venezuela’s oil industry to American investment.

The report was written just days before the midterm elections. Democratic lawmakers repeatedly vowed to bring more transparency and accountability to Washington’s policy toward Venezuela. They will acquire more oversight power in January, after winning control of both chambers.

The report, which KPMG compiled on behalf of the U.S. government, describes the activity of the “Venezuela Custody Account,” which was set up by the U.S. Department of the Treasury to manage the flow of Venezuelan export revenues following the ouster of former President Nicolás Maduro. The account was initially based in Qatar but was moved to Citibank in New York in late January.

The account received $12.26 billion in deposits between Jan. 3, the date of the U.S. military intervention, and the end of September, according to the report. The vast majority of the funds were distributed back to Venezuela soon after they were received, the report shows.

The account had a balance of about $170 million on Sept. 30, the report’s cutoff date. The account also earned about $12 million in interest during the period.

The speed of the disbursements described in the report lends some credence to previous claims by U.S. officials that they serve as mere custodians of the wealth that Venezuela derives from its natural resources, primarily oil.

At its simplest, the report describes a process through which Venezuela’s central bank requested funds from the U.S.-controlled account. U.S. officials then disbursed money after ensuring the requests met financial integrity criteria.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said repeatedly that most of Venezuela’s oil revenues were lost to corruption and foreign middlemen before the United States removed Maduro. Reporting by the Times backs some of those claims.

The KPMG report, however, also provides evidence of the final say that U.S. officials have held over when money is released and who gets funds from the sale of natural resources that under Venezuela’s Constitution belong to Venezuelans.

“The U.S. government established custodial control over Venezuelan natural resources revenue deposits” this year, the report says. It adds that each transaction has to be signed off by officials from the State Department and Treasury.

The Treasury, State Department, KPMG, and Venezuela’s government did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The sale of crude oil accounted for the vast majority of the money sent to the account, the report shows. The account also received much smaller deposits from the sale of minerals and fertilizer, including about $100 million deposited by the global commodities firm Trafigura for the purchase of Venezuelan gold.

The report does not present the full picture of Venezuelan export revenues. Two of Venezuela’s largest crude exporters, U.S. oil giant Chevron and a local producer, NABEP, use different financial arrangements to sell at least some of the oil they pump in Venezuela. And much of Venezuela’s gold continues to be exported to the Middle East through informal financial channels.

Last month, NABEP began sending oil to the United States under a deal through which the company will give the U.S. government 35% of its shares and 20% of its production at below-market rates.

The majority of the money that was sent back to Venezuela from the custody account, $11.7 billion, was used to prop up the country’s national currency, the bolivar, through foreign currency auctions held by Venezuela’s commercial banks.

That amount is in line with independent estimates of Venezuela’s inflows of hard currency.

Sintesis Financiera, a financial consultancy based in Venezuela, estimates that the Venezuelan government spent $12.3 billion on foreign currency auctions in the first nine months of 2026.

U.S. officials also sent about $130 million from the account to pay the Venezuelan government’s foreign bills, mostly debts to other governments and internationals organizations, the report shows.

The report does not identify the ultimate beneficiaries of the currency auctions in Venezuela. Previous reporting by the Times indicates that a large share of the dollars ends up with a small group of Venezuelan agribusinesses and consumer corporations, while many smaller companies struggle to access hard currency needed for investment.

Most of the deposits in the account came from Trafigura and Vitol, two global commodity giants that acquired exclusive rights to sell Venezuelan oil after the U.S. attack. The number of oil buyers has increased, but those two companies continued to dominate Venezuela’s crude trade, the report shows.

Trafigura and Vitol together accounted for 61% of the money deposited in the account by the end of September, the report shows.

This article originally appeared in the New York Times.