The PDVSA didn't have the technical expertise and capital to fully explore and exploit their oil fields. The oil majors had stakes in several projects that wer

The PDVSA didn't have the technical expertise and capital to fully explore and exploit their oil fields. The oil majors had stakes in several projects that were nationalized starting in 2007: http://www.reuters.com/article/venezuela-nationalizations-idUSN1E79I0Z520111201 http://www.reuters.com/article/venezuela-nationalizations-id... Exxon and ConocoPhillips filed arbitration claims which resulted in an attempt to repatriate PDVSA assets. That resulted in the planned sale of Citgo and may have also motivated the repatriation of gold reserves held overseas (but who knows). Citgo eventually ended up issuing $2.5B dollars worth of bonds which stripped the asset of a lot of it's value. Ouch on the price of tires.