Latest update July 17th, 2026 1:38 AM
We don’t know the true oil revenue for 2025
Dear Editor,
As a follow-up to the recently published article, “There Is a US$6.7 Billion Difference Between the Oil Revenues Reported by the Bank of Guyana and Exxon”, there are also discrepancies within Guyana’s own official figures.
Table VII of the Bank of Guyana’s 2025 Annual Report states that oil revenue for 2025 was approximately US$17.8 billion. However, working backwards from the royalty payments reported in the 2025 Natural Resource Fund reports produces total revenue of approximately US$16.6 billion.
Guyana receives a royalty equal to 2% of oil revenue. The reported royalty payments for 2025 total approximately US$331 million. Therefore:
US$331 million ÷ 2% = US$16.6 billion
This US$16.6 billion approximately US$1.2 billion below the US$17.8 billion reported by the Bank of Guyana (BoG).
A third figure emerges when the reported revenues of the three Stabroek Block partners—ExxonMobil, Hess and CNOOC—are added together. Their combined 2025 revenue appears to be approximately US$17.2 billion. That is approximately US$600 million less than the Bank of Guyana’s figure of US$17.8 billion.
We are therefore confronted with at least three different estimates of 2025 oil revenue:
Bank of Guyana: US$17.8 billion
Oil companies’ financial statements: US$17.2 billion
Revenue implied by NRF royalty receipts: US$16.6 billion
These are not insignificant differences. Here is the computation of the 2% royalty based on the various revenue figures. The difference in royalty between what we received, 331 million, versus 2% of what BoG reported is US$24 million. Over 10 to 20 years that anomaly becomes enormous.
According to the Bank of Guyana’s reports, approximately 797 million barrels of oil were produced through the end of 2025. However, the oil companies’ financial statements do not provide sufficient production information to independently reconcile the number of barrels sold with the revenues reported.
Consequently, the public cannot determine whether the Government of Guyana and the oil companies are using different production volumes, different realised oil prices, different accounting periods or different definitions of revenue. Any of these could contribute to the discrepancies.
The Government must explain these differences clearly and publicly.
Sincerely,
Darsh Khusial
Kenrick Hunte
Joe Persaud
On behalf of the Oil and Gas Governance Network
OGGN
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