San Francisco: Shares in Brazil’s state-run oil giant Petrobras reacted in sprightly fashion to positive comments about the company by national president Dilma Rousseff on Thursday.
The stock rose 8.38% to $7.50 in late trading following Rousseff’s assertion that the scandal-wracked firm had purged its corrupt managers and put the bribery affair behind it. And it didn’t hurt that it was hitting record levels of output from offshore production.
“Petrobras has cleaned up what needed to be cleaned, throwing out the people it needed to get rid of that had taken advantage of their positions to enrich themselves,” Rousseff said.
Rousseff had been chairman of Petrobras from 2003 to 2010 but denies any knowledge of the widespread graft at the company. Her popularity has plummeted, however.
Former top executives of the company have been indicted while numerous political allies of Rousseff have been investigated in the multibillion dollar graft probe.
Speaking at a ceremony at a government housing project, Rousseff also touted Petrobras’ record production of 700,000 barrels of oil per day from the subsalt region it is tapping off-shore.
Petrobras said on Thursday it still has no date for the release of some eagerly awaited audited results that could also impact market confidence in the firm.
