
Brazil's total output oil and natural gas output rose in June, the first year-on-year increase in 15 months, as fields idled for repairs came back on line and new areas boosted production, Brazil's petroleum agency, the ANP, said on Friday.

By OilPrice.com Premium Analysts - The pace of oil and gas exploration is frightening, and discoveries are weekly, if not daily, with volumes investors would only have dreamt of a decade ago. With each new discovery, it becomes difficult to keep track of the playing field, and even more difficult to rank the potential.

The Libra deepwater oil field that Brazil plans to auction off Oct 21 will yield minimum output of 1 million barrels of crude per day, the National Petroleum Agency, ANP, said on Friday. That production would be equivalent to half of Brazil's current output of 2 million bpd.

Brazilian state-controlled energy giant Petrobras plans to continue operating in Argentina although it may sell some assets there, CEO Maria da Graças Foster said.

BP and Total, Europe’s biggest oil companies after Shell, won exploration rights in the Amazon basin as Brazil’s first oil auction in five years attracts a record level of bids. Total, based in Paris, gained exploration access to operate five blocks at the Foz do Amazonas basin in northern Brazil together with partners BP and Petrobras, the oil regulator said on Tuesday.

Brazil’s state-controlled oil firm Petrobras sold 11 billion dollars of global debt on Monday in the largest-ever bond offering by a Latin American company. The deal was split in six tranches comprised of fixed- and floating-rate debt with maturities ranging from three to 30 years, according to a report from Thomson Reuters.

Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras found good quality oil in a sub-salt area of the offshore Santos Basin, one of the world's most promising oil frontiers, according to a securities filing by Petrobras on Tuesday.

Brazil’s Petrobras is selling its 20% stake in the Gila prospect in the US Gulf of Mexico as part of its ongoing divestment program. The state-owned company said it had signed a sale and purchase agreement for the sale of its equity in exploration blocks KC 49, 50, 92, 93, 94 and 138, which make up the BP-operated asset.

The Brazilian government has come to the rescue of the sugar-ethanol industry announcing that as of next May first the mandatory content of ethanol in gasoline will increase from 20% to 25%, taxes on the sugar-cane fuel will be eliminated and there will be soft loans to keep expansion going.

Brazil’s oil and gas Petrobras said Argentina needs clear rules to foster investments if it wants to develop its unconventional oil and gas resources.