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RIO DE JANEIRO, Sept. 23 (Xinhua) -- Brazil' s state-run oil and gas giant Petrobras announced on Friday board approval for the sale of 90 percent of its gas pipeline, Nova Transportadora do Sudeste (NTS).
NTS will be sold to Brookfield Infrastructure Partners (BIP) and its affiliates, including China's CIC Capital Corporation. NTS owns a pipeline network stretching 2,048 km across Brazil's southern regions.
According to Petrobras, the sale amounted to 5.2 billion U.S. dollars to be paid in two installments. The first, worth 4.34 billion dollars, will be paid when the transaction is completed, and the rest will be paid five years from now.
"NTS was sold through a competitive process and the transaction price was appraised by four financial institutions," the company said.
The sale is an important part of Petrobras' divestment plan, which seeks to shed assets worth 15.1 billion dollars by the end of 2016 and a further 19.5 billion dollars by the end of 2018.
The company is mired in troubles as a result of a corruption scandal, the country's continued economic recession and the devaluation of Brazilian currency real against the U.S. dollar.
