USDT Payments Were Used in Orlen’s Failed $230 Million Venezuelan Oil Deal, FT Says

Poland’s state-controlled energy giant Orlen ended up with about $29 million worth of oil after a $230 million advance payment, largely in Tether USDt (USDT), unraveled in late 2023 and early 2024. For PSPs and crypto payment intermediaries, the useful detail is not the headline loss but the mechanism: sanctioned commodity trade, stablecoin funding, and a chain of brokers and intermediaries that was supposed to move money around U.S. restrictions.

1. The Financial Times reported that Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA began demanding partial payments in USDT as a workaround to U.S. financial sanctions. The trade in question was set up to buy 6 million barrels of Venezuelan crude oil in November 2023.
2. The $230 million advance payment was sent by Orlen to Hannon International Middle East, a Dubai-based seller, on Dec. 4, 2023. The transaction was orchestrated by Samer Awad, a former executive at Orlen Trading Switzerland (OTS), Orlen’s trading subsidiary.
3. Hannon then reportedly went to crypto brokers and intermediaries to source the USDT needed for the oil purchase. According to the FT account, most of the funds disappeared into a maze of crypto transfers, and Orlen ultimately received only about $29 million worth of oil before terminating the contract.
4. The payment trail described by the FT includes several hops: Hannon reportedly obtained $80 million USDT, paying a $400,000 commission, from a Dubai-based financial services company; later it sent Dubai-based Horizon Global $135 million, while claiming to have received only $85 million in USDT and leaving a $50 million shortfall that Horizon has disputed.
5. Hannon also said it sent Dubai-incorporated Gold Mar International Trading $30 million for a USDT conversion and onward payment to PDVSA, then recovered $21 million of that USDT in February 2024. In January 2024, Hannon employees reportedly handed a Caracas broker two USB sticks containing $60 million and $50 million USDT, and in the following month gave another Caracas broker access to $11 million in USDT.

On March 8, Orlen’s ship was finally loaded with about 500,000 barrels of fuel oil, worth about $28.8 million. Orlen Trading Services then terminated the contract with Hannon on March 28, 2024. For high-risk PSPs, the lesson is plain: once stablecoins enter sanctions-sensitive commodity flows, the operational risk is not just volatility or counterparty credit — it is traceability, control of the payment chain, and whether anyone in the middle can actually prove where the money went.