Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said on Saturday he already has support from congress to start a probe into state-controlled oil giant Petrobras and its pricing policy.
Speaking at an event with evangelical supporters, Bolsonaro said there will be enough lawmaker signatures to start the probe and he believes the investigation could make it lose around 30 billion reais ($ 5.8 billion) in market value on Monday. Petrobras shares plunged as much as 10% on Friday after it announced another domestic fuel price increase.
Brazil’s leader, who is seeking reelection in October, has been publicly bashing Petrobras for what he calls “abusive profits” and has sacked three of its chief executive officers over frustration with the company’s wholesale fuel prices that track international levels while the government struggles to curb inflation.
“It is unacceptable for Petrobras to brag about the profits amid a world crisis,” Bolsonaro said.
Petrobras declined to comment on Saturday. The oil producer has underperformed other crude majors since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and erased gains for the year on Friday. Investors are concerned the company will need to sacrifice profitability at the government’s request to help contain fuel price inflation.
Bolsonaro, who has been trailing former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in polls ahead of the upcoming election, also said he will respect the result of the October vote, but only if elections are clean. The Brazilian president has cast doubt on the country’s electoral system on numerous occasions, saying its electronic ballots are subject to fraud.
Brazil’s electoral court, known as TSE, has said the country’s electronic ballots are internationally recognized as reliable and that no case of fraud has ever been proven since the system was adopted more than two decades ago.
