* The Brazilian government has announced that it has awarded only one of the five oil production blocks that were put up for auction in the second round of its ‘mega auction’ of offshore oil concessions. According to a statement by the national oil agency (ANP), bids were only submitted for one block, the ‘Aram’, but no bids were submitted for the other four blocks all of which are located in the ‘pre-salt’ deep water fields. The only block which received bids was awarded to a consortium made up of Brazil’s state-owned oil firm Petrobras and China’s state-owned firm CNDOC for US$1.26bn, less than anticipated. The lack of interest in the auction prompted Brazil’s mines & energy minister,
Bento Albuquerque, to announce that the government will now review the country’s legislation governing the oil sector, which gives Petrobras preference in the awarding of concessions, in a bid to try to make future auctions are more attractive to private firms.
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