Wednesday, April 15th, 2026
S&P Global Ratings cut Ecopetrol’s long-term credit rating from BB to BB- with a stable outlook in April, following its simultaneous downgrade of Colombia’s sovereign rating — the worst in the country’s history at that level.
With Colombia now a net gas importer and conventional production in sustained decline, energy sector voices are pushing hydraulic fracturing back onto the national agenda as the most credible lever for reversing the country’s hydrocarbon trajectory.
Ecopetrol’s acting president Juan Carlos Hurtado signaled in a press conference that the company is actively reviewing whether to revise its investment plan upward in response to the sharp rise in international crude prices triggered by the US-Israel conflict with Iran.
The ANH published gas production for January and February 2026 and the story has worsened yet again.
In his first press conference as acting president of Ecopetrol, Juan Carlos Hurtado Parra set a deliberately operational tone, laying out eight strategic priorities for the company while distancing himself from the political turbulence that preceded his appointment.
Presidential candidate Iván Cepeda, running on a platform broadly aligned with the Petro government’s ideology, used a campaign rally to outline his energy policy intentions for Ecopetrol, firmly rejecting any dilution of the state’s controlling stake in the company.
The governance fallout from Ricardo Roa’s leave of absence from Ecopetrol’s presidency has taken a new turn, with a minority shareholder of ISA filing a formal petition questioning whether his temporary removal from the helm of the parent company also affects his roles on the boards of subsidiaries ISA and Hocol.
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