Pemex Secures Close to 10% Stake in Repsol

- Pemex Secures Close to 10% Stake in Repsol

Friday, September 02, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
MADRID
by Ilan Brat

Repsol said Friday that Mexico's state-owned oil company has purchased an additional 4.62% stake in the company.

The purchase nearly doubles Petroleos Mexicanos SA's ownership in Repsol to around 9.4%, and comes as Pemex carries out an agreement with fellow Repsol shareholder Sacyr Vallehermoso to vote together in an attempt to exert more control over the Spanish oil firm's board.

The purchase of 56.4 million shares would be worth EUR1.12 billion at Repsol's closing price of EUR19.8 on Friday.

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Repsol: Sacyr, Pemex Deal Excludes Majority of Shareholders

- Repsol: Sacyr, Pemex Deal Excludes Majority of Shareholders

Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
MADRID
by Santiago Perez

Spain's Repsol YPF SA (REP.MC) said Tuesday that it will seek to ensure that the interest of all shareholders is met after two of its top shareholders joined forces to control close to 30% of the voting rights at the oil firm.

As with previous attempts by Sacyr to sell a stake in Repsol to Russia's Lukoil Holdings (LKOH.RS), the Spanish oil company "will ensure that the interest of all shareholders is met, particularly in light of an agreement that excludes a majority of shareholders," Repsol spokesman Kristian Rix said in an emailed statement.

As part of an agreement disclosed late Monday by Spanish construction firm Sacyr-Vallehermoso SA (SYV.MC), Mexican state-owned oil company Petroleos Mexicanos will increase its Repsol stake to 9.8% from 4.8%, and vote together on key company issues with Sacyr.

The two companies said they want to split the chairman and chief executive roles, which are now both held by Antonio Brufau. Brufau has the backing of Catalan lender Caixabank SA (CBNK.MC), Repsol's second-largest shareholder with a stake of about 12%.

In 2008, Sacyr, owner of about 20% of Repsol, sought to sell Repsol shares to Lukoil as part of an effort to cut down on debt.

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Mexico's Pemex Finds Light Crude in Shallow Gulf Waters

- Mexico's Pemex Finds Light Crude in Shallow Gulf Waters

Monday, August 22, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
MEXICO CITY
by Laurence Iliff

Mexico's state-owned oil company Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said Monday that it successfully carried out production tests at new oil field in the southern Gulf of Mexico.

Pemex said the Kinbe-1 well reached an initial average production of 5,600 barrels of light crude per day. The well took more than a year to drill, and was finished Aug. 9. Kinbe-1 also has reached natural gas production of 9 million cubic feet per day on average, the oil monopoly said.

Pemex said "this new discovery increases the petroleum potential of the zone comprised by the fields Tsimin, Xux and Kab" as part of the company's light-crude marine project. Kinbe-1 was drilled in 22 meters of water.

After six years of steady declines in crude-oil production, Pemex is trying to ramp up output in order to break the slide, but has struggled due to declines at the Cantarell offshore fields that once accounted for more than half of the company's total production. Cantarell's decline has brought Pemex's overall production down to just under 2.6 million barrels a day currently from nearly 3.4 million barrels a day in 2004.

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Pemex to Award Its First Incentive Contracts Aug 18

- Pemex to Award Its First Incentive Contracts Aug 18

Friday, July 29, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
MEXICO CITY
by Laurence Iliff

Mexico's state-owned oil company Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said Friday it has set Aug. 18 as the date for the final awarding of its first incentive-based contracts allowed under a 2008 energy reform.

Pemex's first tender under the new contract mechanism is for six mature fields in three groupings in its southern region. Pemex said in a presentation on its website that 27 companies have participated in the tender process for the Magallanes, Santuario and Carrizo drilling areas.

Pemex hopes to use the flexible contracts, which pay bonuses for production above a certain level rather than a set per-barrel rate, to draw the best technology to reactivate about 40 mature fields in total. The flexible contracts will later be used to try and draw oil majors to the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, where Pemex has no production.

Under Mexican law, Pemex can't engage in shared-risk contracts, which is common in deep-water projects, and can't pay contractors with oil.

Carlos Morales, head of Pemex's exploration and production division, said during a conference call Friday that the re-opening of mature fields with new technology has great potential to compensate for the natural decline at other fields such as the super-giant Cantarell offshore complex.

Cantarell has fallen from a peak of about 2 million barrels a day in 2004 to about 460,000 barrels a day, according to Pemex figures. Morales said Cantarell has stabilized and will have significant production levels for a prolonged period of time.

Overall crude oil production in the second-quarter of this year was 2.558 million barrels a day on average, compared with the 2.578 million barrels a day in second-quarter 2010, Pemex said.

Pemex recorded a net profit in the most recent quarter of $769 million versus a net loss of $1.7 billion in the year-ago period. Total sales rose 25% compared to $33.22 billion, mostly on higher crude-oil prices. Cash flow as measured by earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or Ebitda, rose 31% to $24.1 billion, Pemex said.

Ignacio Quesada, director of corporate finances, said oil prices were affected by worries of availability due to events in the Middle East, among other factors, and that prices remained volatile along with other commodities.

Inline with the oil-price increase, Quesada added, Pemex had to pay higher prices for imported gasoline, which it sells at subsidized rates.

The oil monopoly, which funds about one-third of the federal budget, paid $18.6 billion in taxes and duties in the second-quarter, a 43% rise over the second-quarter of 2010.

Pemex said the economic impact of external and structural effects in the first half of the year included $1.2 billion for subsidies to liquefied petroleum gas sales, $900 million on price losses for gasoline imports, and $4.2 billion in labor obligations.

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Pemex to Lease 8 Platforms in Deal Worth $1.2B

- Pemex to Lease 8 Platforms in Deal Worth $1.2B

Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
MEXICO CITY
by Laurence Iliff

Pemex said it expects to issue soon an international tender to lease eight offshore oil platforms, along with other work in the southern Gulf of Mexico, in a deal worth more than $1.2 billion.

Pemex said the rigs will be used for the drilling, termination, maintenance and repair of wells as part of its program to maintain crude-oil output at its two biggest oil complexes in the Gulf: the mature Cantarell fields and nearby Ku-Maloob-Zaap, or KMZ.

A Pemex Exploration and Production committee has approved the tender, which now moves to the board of directors. If authorized, Pemex said, the tender would be published in the official government gazette and posted on its website in July, with some contracts to begin by the end of the year and early next year.

Five of the platforms are destined for KMZ, Pemex's No. 1 production site, which averaged about 845,000 barrels a day during the first five months of the year, according to Pemex preliminary figures.

Two of the platforms are to be used at Cantarell, a supergiant field that began declining in 2004. Cantarell averaged about 465,000 barrels a day in the January-to-May period of this year. Pemex's total crude-oil output averaged about 2.570 million barrels a day over the same five months.

The platform leasing program will be staggered and end in 2016, Pemex said.

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Pemex Evacuates 638 Workers from Leaning Dorm Platform

Pemex Evacuates 638 Workers from Leaning Dorm Platform

Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Dow Jones Newswires
by Laurence Iliff

Pemex said Tuesday it evacuated 638 workers from a semi-submersible dormitory platform after it began to lean to one side when water entered a pontoon.

Pemex said in a statement there were no injuries as a result of the sudden inclination of the Flotel Jupiter platform housing the workers about 80 kilometers (48 miles) off the coast of Ciudad de Carmen, Campeche state.

Since the platform is used only for housing and not for production, Pemex added, the morning incident didn't cause any leakage of hydrocarbons. "Pemex reiterates that neither production nor other activities in the area were affected," the statement said.

Leaning Flotel Jupiter Platform

Since the platform is used only for housing and not for production, Pemex added, the morning incident didn't cause any leakage of hydrocarbons. "Pemex reiterates that neither production nor other activities in the area were affected," the statement said.

The evacuated workers, Pemex said, were taken by transport ships to the Abkatun-Alfa platform. Divers were sealing the affected pontoon on the Jupiter and Pemex said it expected the platform to be stabilized shortly and moved to an inspection area.