Mexico moved ahead of Venezuela in 2025 as Cuba’s main oil supplier, according to a Tuesday article from the Financial Times newspaper, citing new industry data. But President Claudia Sheinbaum was quick to insist that Mexico is not shipping significantly more oil to Cuba than in previous years.
Mexico was estimated to have sent a daily average of 12,284 barrels of oil to Cuba in 2025, contributing 44% of the Caribbean island’s crude imports, while Venezuela exported an estimated 9,528 barrels per day (bpd) of oil to Cuba, accounting for 34% of its imported crude.
“… #Venezuela, long the biggest supplier to #Cuba, exported 9,528 bpd or 34%. Its exports to Cuba last year, similar to their 2024 level, were 63% lower than in 2023… Mexican #oil #exports to the US… almost halved from June 2023 to October 2025…”🤔 https://t.co/gRuHC47ihZ pic.twitter.com/ACaTh7O8QZ
— Mark Warner (@MAAWLAW) January 6, 2026
That 10 percentage-point difference supports the Financial Times conclusion that Mexico is now the No. 1 exporter of oil to Cuba, with Russia a distant third.
But as Sheinbaum hinted, the 56% rise in Mexican shipments to Cuba in 2025 compared to 2024 would not have been nearly enough to overtake the South American nation if Venezuela’s exports to Cuba had not fallen by 63% since 2023.
During the last two years of the López Obrador administration, Mexico’s state-owned oil firm Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) subsidized the shipment of at least 10 million barrels of oil to Cuba, according to a December report from the non-profit Mexicans Against Corruption and Impunity.
Between July 2023 and September 2024, Pemex shipped crude oil and refined products to Cuba worth approximately 15.6 billion pesos (US $869 million) through its Gasolinas Bienestar SA de CV subsidiary, the company stated in reports submitted to investors on the Mexican Stock Exchange.
In her daily press conference on Wednesday, President Sheinbaum said, “We are not sending more oil than we have historically,” and added, “Of course, with the current situation in Venezuela, Mexico has obviously become an important supplier. Before, it was Venezuela.”
When asked if Mexico would supply a larger quantity of crude oil to Cuba now, given the U.S. embargo on Venezuela, Sheinbaum would only say that part of what is sent “is by contract, and also the aid that has been provided historically.”
The Trump administration, however, has made it clear that any oil shipments to Cuba defy his demand that Mexico and other Latin American nations play a “constructive regional role aligned with U.S. foreign policy goals.” They become, then, another pretext for the U.S. president’s escalating threats against Mexico.
With reports from Aristegui Noticias and El Economista
