Majors come calling for Brazil's pre-salt

Shell and Petrobras were the big winners in Brazil's latest upstream bid round, along with backers of Brazil's oil reforms

Big oil is ready to bet on Brazil again. That was the takeaway from October's pre-salt bid round, the first since 2013 which follows a raft of investor-friendly reforms earlier this year which overhauled the oil industry's regulatory landscape. Six of eight blocks potentially holding more than 10bn barrels of reserves were awarded to a raft of international majors. The government expects the round to draw in tens of billions of dollars in investment. It should also set the stage for exploration to pick up again in the pre-salt after a long lull in bid rounds for new areas. State-run Petrobras was the pre-salt round's big winner, flexing its muscles as it looks to lift itself from undoubtedly