Oil giant Chevron confirmed that it will expand operations in Venezuela after President Donald Trump announced an ambitious deal to develop the nation’s oil reserves and give the Pentagon a stake in the profits.

Chevron, the only U.S. oil company with a major presence in Venezuela, said Wednesday that it has been assigned additional acreage in the Orinoco Belt, where it has active operations. The company plans to invest more than $7 billion over the next five years, with the goal of more than doubling its current production to about 600,000 barrels a day.

“Chevron’s history in Venezuela spans more than a century, and our expanded position reflects our confidence in the country’s deep resource potential,” CEO Mike Wirth said in a prepared statement.

Venezuela holds the world’s largest proven reserves, totaling more than 303 billion barrels of crude oil, according to OPEC’s 2025 Annual Statistical Bulletin. Saudi Arabia is a distant second with 267 billion barrels.

Yet because Venezuela’s energy infrastructure is severely degraded and the nation is operating under international sanctions, its daily production is just over 1 million barrels, compared with the 10 million to 11 million barrels that Saudi Arabia produces each day. The U.S. produces almost 14 million barrels per day.

Chevron, the second-largest U.S. oil company, has had a presence in Venezuela since 1923.

The White House confirmed Monday that it is partnering with North American Blue Energy Partners as part of Trump’s push to tap into Venezuela’s oil industry.

“What we’re doing is increasing the confidence for private businesses to come do deals in Venezuela, directly with the government of Venezuela,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said during an interview Wednesday on CNBC.

Yet the agreement has been met with skepticism from energy experts who say it will take years to revive Venezuela’s oil industry, which is in disarray after years of neglect.

Meanwhile, the national average price for a gallon of regular gasoline jumped Wednesday to $4.12, according to the motor club AAA. That is 93 cents more than it cost at this point last year.

Advertising

Google ad business spared a breakup

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that Google must make changes to address its advertising technology monopoly but would not need to break up that business, as the company staved off the most extreme measures to curb its power.

The judge, Leonie M. Brinkema, issued her decision after finding last year that Google broke the law to protect its dominance over the largely invisible system of technology that places ads on pages across the web.

Brinkema, who sits on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, did not publicly reveal her full opinion, but previewed it in a short filing. Brinkema said Google must still adopt some changes to its ad tech business, according to an entry on the public docket for the lawsuit. The changes fall short of forcing the company to sell off parts of the business, which the government had requested.

MAGAZINES

Saturday Evening Post to stop printing

For more than two centuries, the Saturday Evening Post has chronicled American life in its pages, enshrining a homespun national identity and printing some of the nation’s greatest writers.

That’s changing next year.

The magazine’s January issue will be its last in print, according to Joan SerVaas, the president and publisher. In a letter to the Post’s 50,000 subscribers in the most recent issue, she attributed the decision to a combination of “rising production costs, declining advertising revenue and shifting reader habits.”

The magazine, which debuted in 1821, will continue to publish new articles and fiction online.

The Post archives, which will be preserved online contain news articles as well as poetry, fiction and art, including iconic images by Norman Rockwell.

Restructuring

Uber to lay off 3,300 employees

Uber is laying off roughly 10% of its workforce, totaling about 3,300 people, as the ride-hailing company restructures to become “simpler and faster,” CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said Wednesday.

The layoffs are set to affect 20% of rank-and-file employees who are seven or more layers below Khosrowshahi, he said. He added that Uber would increase the number of employees under each manager by cutting teams that have only one to two workers by half, which would flatten the company.

He said Uber’s revenue has nearly tripled over the past five years, but rapid growth has introduced “more layers, more coordination and more fragmented ownership.”

In Wednesday’s announcement, Uber said it would also consolidate its delivery operations and some engineering and science teams.

— From news services