The prestigious PFC Energy 50 list of the world’s biggest energy companies now has Brazil’s state-run Petrobras in third place (the listing is based on market capitalization).
According to PFC Energy, Petrobras, with a market capitalization of $228.9 billion, is by far South America’s biggest energy company (the second biggest energy company in the region is Colombia’s ECOPETROL with a market capitalization of $87 billion).
Worldwide, Petrobras is behind only ExxonMobil ($368.7 billion) and PetroChina ($303.3 billion). Petrobras is bigger than third-place Royal Dutch
Shell ($207.9 billion), fourth-place Chevron ($183.6 billion) and the Russian giant, Gazprom ($149.4 billion), in fifth place.
In a note, Petrobras points out that as far as the PFC Energy 50 list is concerned, the company has been doing very well, thank you. Suffice it to say that, in the first PFC Energy 50 ranking of 1999, Petrobras was in 27th place (with a market value of $13.5 billion).
In a note, PFC Energy points out that in 2010 a decline of 23% in stock prices at Petrobras was compensated by a successful $67 billion capitalization campaign.