By Nathan Crooks
HOUSTON, Nov 13 (Reuters) - Foreign investors led by Signum Global Advisors are heading to Caracas on Sunday, betting that Venezuela's reopening to foreign capital will outlast any political shifts in the South American country or in Washington.
Sixty-five people will join the advisory firm's second visit to Venezuela since US forces removed Nicolas Maduro from power in January. The trip comes less than two weeks after Democrats won control of the US Congress in midterm elections, raising questions about the durability of President Donald Trump's Venezuela policy.
"I think any future US administration, Democratic or Republican, will want Venezuela to succeed," Signum's chairman and founder Charles Myers told Reuters on Thursday, adding he did not expect Democratic control of Congress to change the nature of the "excellent" relationship between the two countries.
New York-based Signum's view is that Venezuela will likely transition to democracy before the 2028 US presidential election, he said, adding that interim President Delcy Rodriguez's administration has improved security and conditions for investors.
In January, Venezuela's National Assembly approved a reform of Venezuela's main oil law that allows increased autonomy for companies to operate oil and gas projects.
Opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Corina Machado said in September that only a "serious, democratic government" can provide the stability investors need. Since she returned to Venezuela last month, Machado has promised to review contracts and criticized an agreement between the US and producer NABEP to control about a fifth of the country's oil reserves.
Myers said it was likely too early for his group to meet with opposition leaders and that foreign investors are mainly looking at the reforms that have occurred and structures for foreign investment.
"You don't need a transition to democracy if you're a foreign investor to make investments," he said.
BACK TO CARACAS
Signum — which focuses on countries undergoing "political inflection" and has taken investors to Ukraine, Syria and Greenland in the past two years — began planning its first Venezuela trip last December, before Maduro's capture, with the view that Trump was serious about removing him one way or another, Myers said.
That first trip took more than 50 people to Caracas in March. This time, Signum's delegation includes oil and gas, infrastructure and chemicals investors, as well as bondholders and emerging-market investors from the US, Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Latin America.
Venezuela has the world's largest proven oil reserves, but decades of under-investment and years of economic sanctions that targeted Maduro have strained the industry.
The investors plan to meet top officials in Rodriguez's government, representatives of the central bank and state oil company PDVSA, and private-sector CEOs, said Myers, who declined to name them, citing security and client privacy.
The group also plans to visit the Caracas Stock Exchange to gauge the market's liquidity, learn about the top companies being traded and see if governance is in place "to actually buy Venezuelan equities," he added.
"The still-biggest opportunity is in the oil and gas sector" and related infrastructure, he said.
(Reporting by Nathan Crooks in Houston, with additional reporting by Marianna Parraga in Houston; Editing by Rod Nickel)