Exclusive: Petrobras aims to make Africa its main exploratory region outside Brazil
The firm also seeks to explore India's coast, taking part in an upcoming oil block auction scheduled for July, CEO Magda Chambriard told Reuters.
In recent years, Petrobras has shown an interest in buying stakes in oil assets abroad, especially in Africa, as it looks to boost reserves while it faces delays in obtaining environmental permits to drill for new oil in Brazil.
"We are experts in the eastern margin of Brazil," said Chambriard, citing geological similarities between the region and Africa. "The correlation between Brazil and Africa is unequivocal, so we need to go to Africa."
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Japanese yen-led dollar pullback to offer mild support to rupee at open
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July 22 (Reuters) - India's equity benchmarks are poised to open marginally higher on Tuesday, supported by strong earnings from top private lenders, while investors await a potential trade deal with the U.S. before the August 1 deadline. The Gift Nifty futures were trading at 25,183.5 points as of 7:52 a.m. IST, indicating that the Nifty 50 (.NSEI), opens new tab will open above Monday's close of 25,090.7. Both benchmarks, the Nifty and Sensex (.BSESN), opens new tab, gained on Monday, boosted by upbeat June-quarter results from heavyweights HDFC Bank ( opens new tab and ICICI Bank ( opens new tab. However, weakness in Reliance Industries ( opens new tab, amid concerns over its oil-to-chemicals and retail segments, capped broader gains. "Positive results from banking majors are supporting the market rebound after many days of consolidation," said Vinod Nair, head of research at Geojit Investments. "The markets remain highly reactive to earnings, indicating that investors remain focused on the earnings front to aid valuation." Investors are now awaiting earnings results from United Breweries ( opens new tab and Colgate-Palmolive India ( opens new tab later in the day. Meanwhile, the broader Asian markets were steady following Wall Street's overnight gains, as the U.S. intensified tariff negotiations with key partners ahead of the fast-approaching deadline. Foreign institutional investors (FII) sold Indian shares worth 16.81 billion rupees ($195 million) on Monday, while domestic institutional investors (DII) bought stocks worth 35.78 billion rupees, per provisional data from the NSE. ** PNB Housing Finance ( opens new tab posts 23% rise in first-quarter profit, helped by steady home loan demand ** Havells India ( opens new tab misses quarterly estimates on weak demand and rising competition ** BL Kashyap ( opens new tab bags order worth 9.1 billion rupees ($1 = 86.1750 Indian rupees)
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The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation defended the credibility of its labour force data and its representation of India's labour market dynamics, saying the PLFS uses Computer-Assisted Personal Interviews to improve data quality and reduce errors, and noted international agencies use its data in their reporting. While it is difficult to provide an alternate estimate of the jobless rate, 17 experts surveyed did, giving a median of 10%, ranging from 7% to as high as 35%. For years, India published official unemployment rates of around 4%, partly because statisticians counted unpaid family labour and subsistence work as employment. Experts argue this diverges from international norms and makes the jobless rate incomparable with other countries. And it is not just academics and career labour market experts who are concerned about data accuracy. "Unemployment is one of our big challenges and I don't believe the government data reflects the true ground situation," said Duvvuri Subbarao, Reserve Bank of India Governor from 2008-2013. Subbarao said the kind of jobs being created also matters. As high-growth sectors like finance and IT tend to be less labour-intensive, he called for a sharper policy focus on manufacturing, which holds greater potential for large-scale employment. About a quarter of experts polled had no problem with the accuracy of official jobless data. "No one in the world has perfect employment data. People assume the U.S. labour force survey is perfect. It's not. Our PLFS is very robust now. People just don't want to believe it," said Surjit Bhalla, former executive director for India at the International Monetary Fund. But several experts said even if methodologically sound, official figures fail to capture deeper challenges. On its current path, India will take at least two decades to match the female labour force participation rates of other G20 countries, the survey found. A lack of strong job creation is also showing up in stagnating wages. "We are home to some of the big dollar billionaires… the wealth of some of the elite has been growing dramatically over the past decade. But real wages are not growing. Half of the workers are getting less than they got even 10 years ago. To me, these are not signs of a healthy economy," said Jayati Ghosh, professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. "We should be prioritising good quality employment generation," she said. Asked what the government should prioritise to create more high-quality jobs, several said improving education and skills, promoting private investment and reducing regulatory hurdles. "Stop selling the narrative that farm jobs growth (is) to be read as jobs growth. Adopt an industrial policy, with a manufacturing strategy that is horizontal in nature, not a PLI type picking winners tactic, that is clearly failing," said Santosh Mehrotra, professor at the University of Bath. PLI (Production Linked Incentive) is a subsidy scheme to boost domestic manufacturing. The government scaled back the scheme just four years after its launch.
