VOL. XLI

No. 40

5-October-1998

OPEC

Declining Oil Prices And Budget Revenues

In Venezuela, the Minister of Finance, Ms. Maritza Izaguirre,said on 30 September that the government will cut public spending by a further $736mn tocompensate for lower oil revenue. Ms. Izaguirre added that the state oil company, PDVSA,will pay the government an extraordinary dividend of $937mn (largely from PDVSAsundistributed profits for 1997) to cope with the 1998 fiscal deficit. On 1 October Ms.Izaguirre added that...