February 7, 2005
Citgo studying ways to improve earnings

(World News Network) - "The executive appointed to head Citgo Petroleum Corp. said that officials plan to review the company's operations to optimize earnings. Félix Rodríguez, designated the next president of Citgo, said there is no current plan to sell off assets, but rather to uphold commitments to clients and employees while studying ways to improve earnings.

'Our plans are directed at optimizing the margin of earnings,' Rodríguez said. 'We are open to doing business with companies that are in the market that permit us to share risk'. Citgo, a U.S.-based unit of Venezuela's state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A., supplies 8 percent to 10 percent of gasoline consumed in the United States and has about 4,000 employees, Rodríguez said.

He said eventually the review 'could include the sale of some assets' but that 'we will keep the commitments we have made' to both clients and employees.

'We are going to be very responsible,' Rodríguez told the AP. 'The term is not a plan to sell but rather to evaluate our business'. He said the costs of complying with environmental regulations in the United States are escalating and that Citgo is interested in searching for ways to share costs of some investments with other firms".