Mexico Ends Partnership With Spanish Oil Giant Repsol

MADRID, Spain -- Mexican state oil company Pemex on Wednesday sold most of its holding in Spanish oil giant Repsol (IW 1000/49), ending a quarter-century partnership that had become increasingly tense in recent years.

Repsol analysts welcomed the sale, saying it should help ease boardroom tensions at the company, while the Spanish government said the move would not hurt ties between Spain and Mexico.

The stake sale comes just five days before Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto is due to make his first official visit to Spain.

Pemex sold 7.9% of Repsol to unspecified private investors for 2.092 billion euros ($2.85 billion) in a placement handled by investment banks Citigroup Global Markets and Deutsche Bank.

The Repsol board has been "very divided," and Pemex's departure "could be positive in the medium term," he added.

Shares in Repsol, which were suspended from trading ahead of the announcement of the stake sale, closed down 3.6% at 20.11 euros, just above the price of the placement of 20.10 euros per share.

The stock was the biggest loser in the Ibex-35 index of most traded shares, which closed down 0.2% overall.

"In the medium term we feel that Pemex's exit is favorable since it was a source of instability in Repsol's ownership [that] has been eliminated," equity analyst Sonia Ruiz de Garibay of Beka Finance wrote in a research note.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2014