Brazil's Petrobras Moving Toward Trading in National Currencies

VIENNA (Sputnik) - Brazil’s energy giant Petrobras may start trading in national currencies such as the yuan, CEO Jean Paul Prates told Sputnik.

"Yeah, we will move into that. That depends also on the authorizations of the Central Bank, of our Ministry of Economy. But nowadays, with the current government, we have no resistance to that. We've been talking about contracts in yuan. We were talking about contracts for Argentina, for instance, very important, because they are very short of dollars. So, we will almost be forced to deal with that kind of alternative towards the dollar," Prates told Sputnik on the sidelines of the OPEC International Seminar in Vienna.

Petrobras also remains open to digital currencies such as Bitcoin and has a department looking into that option, the executive added.

More countries have been moving away from the US dollar in mutual trade. In the energy sector, Russia and India have been exploring the option of trading in national currencies, bypassing the need to use the US dollar, as the South Asian country is a major buyer of Russian energy. However, the talks between Moscow and New Delhi about settling trade in rupees were suspended this May.

On Brazilian Oil Industry

Brazil's oil output is expected to continue growing this year and in 2024 by about 4-5%.

"We have two new FPSOs [floating production storage and offloading vessel] that came out right now, this year. So, we may have another increment of 4% or 5%… this year and next year as well, because of the plans that we already have, of FPSOs that are already being built and will come into operations very soon," Jean Paul Prates told Sputnik on the sidelines of the OPEC International Seminar in Vienna.

The Brazilian National Agency of Petroleum, Natural Gas and Biofuels (ANP) reported that in 2022, the country's oil production climbed to 3 million barrels a day, showing a 4% increase compared to 2021. Meanwhile, the country's total oil reserves increased by 10.6% compared to the previous year, or by 26.91 billion barrels.

At the same time, Brazil's proven oil reserves grew by 11.5%, and are now totaling 14.9 billion barrels. Its oil exports jumped 68.3%, to 1.3 billion barrels a day.