Fiscal Accountability: Following Guyana’s Oil Money and Public Spending

Fiscal Accountability: Following Guyana’s Oil Money and Public Spending

OPINION BY :Hem Kumar September 2026        

This two-part series examines the unanswered questions inside the Government’s mid-year fiscal report—not to allege wrongdoing, but to establish what the public needs to see in order to verify that every dollar is properly accounted for. That framing is important: transparency alone does not prove accountability, but public disclosure makes meaningful scrutiny possible.

Part I

Fiscal Accountability, Part I: Oil Money, the NRF and the Missing Public Ledger

The first half of 2026 has produced a dramatic official revaluation of Guyana’s oil-income outlook. Government now projects petroleum deposits of US$6.4976 billion for 2026—136.8 percent above the amount projected when Budget 2026 was prepared.

It also now expects 84 Government profit-oil lifts from 326 projected Stabroek Block lifts, compared with the earlier estimate of 40 Government lifts out of 309 total lifts. That is an enormous revision in a short period. It may be explained by production growth, higher oil prices and faster cost recovery—but explanation is not the same as public verification.

The issue is not oil income alone

According to the report, Government received US$1.7786 billion from profit oil during January to June 2026 and US$218.4 million in royalties. The Natural Resource Fund balance stood at US$4.2942 billion at the end of June, after withdrawals of US$1.020 billion, and inclusive of US$66.9 million in interest income.

Those are large aggregate figures. But aggregate figures do not permit the public to trace an individual cargo of crude from offshore loading to sale, payment, deposit and eventual use in the national budget.

Fiscal transparency means more than the release of totals. It requires sufficiently complete public information on revenues, expenditure, liabilities, contracts, projections and the assumptions used to generate official claims. 

The cost-bank question

The Government says that “cost-bank desaturation,” accelerated by high crude prices and rapid development, will significantly increase Guyana’s profit-oil entitlement. Under the Stabroek PSA, contractors may recover costs up to 75 percent of gross revenue, with the remaining profit oil shared between Guyana and the co-venturers.

That makes the cost bank one of the most consequential financial records in the country. If the cost bank is declining, Guyana’s share of profit oil should rise. But the public report does not state the opening cost-bank balance, the closing balance, costs added, costs recovered, disputed costs, disallowed costs, or the monthly cost-oil percentage.

Without that underlying ledger, the public is being asked to accept an extraordinary increase in projected oil income without being shown the arithmetic.

Questions for public answer  

The following questions should be answered publicly and with source documents:

1. What was the Stabroek Block cost-bank balance on January 1, 2026, and what was its balance on June 30, 2026?
2. How much was added to the cost bank during the first half of 2026, broken down by project and by cost type?
3. How much was recovered during each month from January through June 2026?
4. What was the cost-oil percentage in each month of 2026?
5. What costs remain under audit, dispute, review or possible disallowance?
6. What calculations caused Government’s estimate of profit-oil lifts to move from 40 to 84?
7. What assumptions were used for crude prices, production volumes, project costs and the One Guyana FPSO ramp-up?
8. What was the realized sale price for every cargo of Guyana’s profit oil?
9. Who bought each cargo, and what deductions, commissions, marketing fees, freight costs or quality differentials applied?
10. On what date was each cargo loaded, invoiced, paid for and deposited into the NRF?

The public ledger Guyana needs

Government should publish a searchable, lift-by-lift public ledger covering:

♦FPSO and cargo identification number                                          ♦Loading date and volume in barrels                                                              ♦Buyer or trader                                                                                            ♦Benchmark crude price and realized price                                        ♦Quality differential and all deductions                                                          ♦Invoice date and payment date                                                                      ♦Deposit date into the Natural Resource Fun                                        ♦Royalty calculation                                                                                ♦Applicable cost-oil and profit-oil calculation                                              ♦The Government’s final revenue from that lift

A government account is most useful when the public can connect money to underlying activity, contracts, outcomes and supporting records—not merely read summary totals.

Closing

Guyana does not need rumors to demand accountability. It needs records. The question is not whether the country is earning more from oil. It plainly is. The question is whether citizens can independently follow every barrel, every payment, every cost-recovery deduction and every dollar transferred into the Natural Resource Fund.

Until the detailed ledger is public, Guyana knows the headline—but not the full story behind it.