A Brazilian judge has blocked a deal that would have seen the state oil firm Petrobras sell off a minority interest in its gas-producing subsidiary Gaspetro to Japan’s Mitsui, according to Reuters.
The deal, valued at $469m, was made in October last year.
But now a judge in a Federal Regional Tribunal in the northern state of Bahia has ruled that the deal did not meet transparency requirements and thus was susceptible to the same dubious practices that have plunged Petrobras into its prolonged and widespread bribes-for-inflated-contracts scandal. Among those practices were secret negotiations and price fixing.
Attempting to sell off the stake in Gaspetro is part of a huge divestment of assets under way by Petrobras as it aims to reduce some of its massive debt.
