By Kjetil Malkenes Hovland

OSLO-Norway's Statoil ASA (STO) said Friday it had acquired a 66% stake in an offshore license off Brazil from Petroleo Brasileiro SA for $2.5 billion, including the major Carcara discovery, in a bid to strengthen its production into the next decade.

Statoil said the BM-S-8 offshore license included a substantial part of the Carcara oil field in the Santos basin, one of the world's largest discoveries in recent years. The company estimated the license to contain recoverable volumes of 700 million to 1.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

Brazil's Petrobras, the most indebted oil firm in the world, has pledged to divest more than $15 billion in assets by the end of this year in an effort to pay down its debts, but ahead of today's announcement it had only managed to raise about $2 billion.

The acquisition also comes at a time of rising debt for 67% state-owned Statoil, which continues to pay dividends to shareholders and invest in new production. Its debt ratio--debt as a share of its capital--stood at 31.2% at the end of the first quarter, up from 22.4% a year earlier.

Write to Kjetil Malkenes Hovland at kjetilmalkenes.hovland@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 29, 2016 03:15 ET (07:15 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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