How to look at Venezuela's oil industry?  Well, Venezuela has the largest known crude oil reserves in the world.  That is the good.  And within those reserves, it has an abundance of extra heavy crude oil, which is hard to refine.  That is the bad.  Within that challenge, the socialist nation has some of the most inept people in the world managing its industry: Venezuelan politicians.  That is the ugly. Venezuela wrestled with this "bad" problem of extra-heavy oil for decades.  Luis Giusti was president of Venezuela's national oil company, PDVSA, in 1994, several years before Hugo Chávez was elected president and set the country on its current course.  Giusti had two key visions: consolidate the PDVSA sister companies into one, and develop the extra-heavy crude oil Venezuela held in abundance.  Giusti created "la apertura," or...(Read Full Post)