China’s largest government-owned oil companies are privately asking the Chinese government for protection, as US pressure on Venezuela grows, putting one of China’s oldest and most expensive overseas energy investments at greater risk.

Executives from firms led by China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC) have raised concerns with senior government agencies in recent days, seeking advice on how to protect their investments and align any response with China’s broader diplomatic posture, according to people familiar with the discussions., Bloomberg reported.

At stake are claims on some of the world’s largest oil reserves and billions of dollars that may yet prove unrecoverable.

Beijing has condemned reports that the Trump administration is urging Venezuela to break ties with America’s geopolitical rivals, describing the move as an act of “bullying” and insisting that the rights of third countries must be respected.

Behind the rhetoric, Chinese officials are reassessing the commercial exposure their companies face if political pressure intensifies.

China’s oil firms have built a substantial footprint across Latin America, nowhere more so than in Venezuela.

Since 2007, when Beijing began extending large-scale financing under then-president Hugo Chávez, Chinese lenders and energy companies have poured money into oil fields, refineries and petrochemical plants.

As US sanctions tightened, China became Venezuela’s largest oil buyer and its biggest creditor.

That strategy has aged poorly. Years of economic collapse and chronic mismanagement have left Venezuela’s oil infrastructure badly degraded.

Under President Nicolás Maduro, crude output has fallen sharply, and many projects now operate far below their designed capacity.

Chinese companies have steadily pulled back as the risks mounted and Beijing’s overseas priorities shifted, though some have kept staff on the ground to manage joint ventures with state producer PDVSA.

The debt, however, remains. Venezuela still owes Chinese institutions billions of dollars, much of it tied to crude-backed loans extended by policy banks such as China Development Bank. Earlier this week, China’s top financial regulator instructed major lenders to report their Venezuela-related exposure and strengthen risk monitoring, a sign that officials are bracing for adverse outcomes.

Oil imports from Venezuela now account for just four percent of China’s total crude purchases in 2025, making supply disruption a manageable concern. The deeper anxiety lies elsewhere: the scale of past spending, the uncertainty of repayment, and the lingering possibility that assets once seen as strategic could, in a worst-case scenario, be written down to zero.