Brazil: Interim president appoints new CEO for Petrobras
Brazil's acting president, Michel Temer, has appointed the current head of the Sao Paulo stock exchange as CEO of the country's state oil company Petróleo Brasileiro SA (Petrobras).
New CEO Pedro Parente was the former head of agribusiness group Bunge and had already served in the board of Petrobras from 1999 to 2003. The appointment is seen as another business-friendly move by interim president Temer, who replaces suspended President Dilma Rousseff.
Petrobras has been embroiled in huge corruption scandal that has shaken up the company´s structure and Brazil´s political status quo. Parente will have to restore market confidence in the oil company and repair its troubled finances.
The payoff its debts and balance the books, Petrobras has been offloading assets for the last months. However, of the $15 billion it hopes to raise in these operations during 2015 and 2016 it has only managed $2 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Parente has announced his intentions of changing the culture at Petrobras. “There will be no political appointments inside Petrobras,” said Parente.
