In 5 years, Guyana gave up US$10B in taxes to Exxon and partners

Feb 12, 2025 News

…collected US$6B in same period in profits and royalties

Kaieteur News- Guyana has so far given up over US$10B in taxes since it began producing oil in December 2019. During the same five-year period (2019-2024), the country’s Natural Resource Fund (NRF) received just over US$6B.

According to the December 2024 NRF report, a total of US$6,049,759,409 was paid into the NRF since 2019, including US$786,190,162 in royalty.

In 5 years, Guyana gave up US$10B in taxes to Exxon and partners

President Irfaan Ali

This therefore means that Guyana and Exxon shared approximately US$10.5B in profits during the period.

It can further be deduced a whopping US$42B in revenue was generated between December 2019 and December 2024, since 75% of the total revenue was deducted by ExxonMobil for cost recovery.

As such, at a 25% tax rate, it would mean that Guyana lost over US$10B in taxes to the Stabroek Block partners alone in five years.

The Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) between the GoG and ExxonMobil does not require the company to pay any corporate taxes.

The contract states in Article 15.1 that the Contractor (ExxonMobil Guyana Limited) as well as its affiliates shall not be subjected to tax, value-added tax, excise tax, duty, fee, charge, or impost in respect of income derived from petroleum operations, property held or transactions except as specified under the agreement.

Further, Article 15.4 states that the sum equivalent to the taxes owed by the company will be paid by the Minister responsible for Petroleum to the Commissioner General of the GRA. It should be noted that the contract also allows for the issuing of a receipt to ExxonMobil, indicating that it has met the local tax requirements to avoid the burden of double taxation.

President, ExxonMobil Guyana Limited, Alistair Routledge

Though the fiscal terms of the contract have been condemned by Guyanese politicians, the incumbent administration has blatantly refused to engage the company for changes to the contract.

President Irfaan Ali during his end of year press conference on December 31, 2024 made it clear that he has no interest in writing U.S. oil major, ExxonMobil to engage the company to renegotiate the oil deal.

He explained, “What we committed to was to respect the sanctity of contracts and that the international law, that has implications for us as a country. Other investors are looking on but what we said was that future PSAs would not have these fatal flaws and future PSAs would not have the type of lopsided arrangements that Exxon had, and we have made those adjustments to future PSAs.”

But even as Guyana continues to refuse to engage the company, the country is losing more revenue than it is gaining from the production of oil, as pointed out earlier in this article.

In fact, while the country gives away revenue in taxes, it is increasing its national debt. By the end of 2024, the debt increased to US$6B and is expected to climb further by the end of this year to US$7.5B.

(In 5 years, Guyana gave up US$10B in taxes to Exxon and partners)

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five years, NRF, PSA, royalty, tax

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