Brazil Meat Tycoons Expand in Oil and Gas With Bolivia Deal

(Bloomberg) — Brazil’s Batista brothers are expanding the family energy footprint in oil and gas with the acquisition of a company that has three natural-gas fields in the Tarija-Chaco basin in Bolivia.

Fluxus, the oil and gas company owned by Wesley and Joesley Batista — the tycoons who built beef giant JBS SA — completed a deal Thursday to buy Pluspetrol Bolivia. Fluxus will eventually send gas produced in Bolivia to the Cuiaba thermal power plant in Brazil, Chief Executive Officer Ricardo Savini said in a text message Friday. The facility belongs to another company owned by the Batistas, he said.

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The Tacobo, Tajibo and Yacuiba fields currently have a combined production of about 100,000 cubic meters of natural gas per day, with the potential for more than 1 million cubic meters per day, the Fluxus said in a statement. In addition to the gas reserves, the assets include two gas treatment plants and the capacity to transport production to the Bolivian, Brazilian and Argentinian market.

The move is strategic for Fluxus as it focuses on creating a multinational oil and gas venture in Latin America. The oil firm is in the final stages of transition to operate the Centenario field in Neuquén, Argentina.

Pluspetrol currently operates 412,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day and has activities in Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, the United States, the Netherlands, Peru and Uruguay.

(Updates with comment from Fluxus CEO in second paragraph.)

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