CNPC in talks with Eni for US$4b gas assets in Mozambique
China's oil giant targets stake in Mozambique project in its biggest overseas investment
China National Petroleum Corp, the country's biggest oil company, is in talks with Eni for a stake in a gas project in Mozambique valued at as much as US$4 billion, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.
Italy's largest oil firm might sell a 20 per cent stake in a gas block to CNPC to share the cost of developing the project, the people said, asking not to be identified because the talks are private.
The companies had been in talks for at least six months and final terms had yet to be agreed upon, they said.
The deal would, if completed, rank as the biggest overseas investment made by CNPC or its listed unit PetroChina. China's largest producers have bought African oil and gas fields in countries ranging from Nigeria to Uganda to feed energy demand in the economy.
Mozambique's offshore fields might hold enough gas to meet world consumption for more than two years, the national oil company said. Eni and Anadarko Petroleum, the two companies leading exploration in Mozambique, agreed last year to build the world's second-largest liquefied gas export plant to start sending fuel abroad in 2018.
An official at Eni declined to comment. So did Liu Weijiang, a Beijing-based spokesman at CNPC.
