"Scary": Plunging crude prices rattle Petrobras, but "projects resilient"

The ongoing plunge in crude prices is "scary," but oil projects run by Brazil's Petrobras are resilient, said a director at the state-run oil company on Wednesday, as the country's oil sector reacts to US tariffs imposed last week.

"No Petrobras project will be paralyzed. These are long-term projects. If you compare this to (the market drop in) 2020, it's a joke. It's a moment of instability," Sylvia dos Anjos, the company's head of exploration and production, told journalists at an event in Rio de Janeiro.

The lower price will not diminish interest in Brazil's planned auction of offshore oil blocks set to happen in June, said Symone Araujo, a director at Brazil's oil regulator, ANP.

Break-even prices for oil projects in Brazil are lower than the current price of crude, said Araujo.

Oil prices hit fresh four-year lows on Wednesday.

The global tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump last week, which led to the lower oil prices, are considered by Brazil's government to be damaging to the energy sector and the energy transition, said Brazil's Secretary of Oil, Gas and Biofuels Pietro Mendes.

(Reporting by Fabio Teixeira; Writing by Isabel Teles; Editing by Brad Haynes and Rod Nickel)