As SEN went to press, it was announced that PROSERV had been sold by one private equity group to another. The seller was Intervale Capital which formed the Proserv Group over a number of years by combining the ‘old’ Proserv IRM company with Azura and the controls division of Weatherford. The buyer is Riverstone Holdings which is a $27bn investment firm. Riverstone is acquiring all the shares in Proserv includings those held by Weatherford and other minority shareholders. No price has been put on the deal.

From Houston (BN): PETROBRAS has come under fire from two sides - a prominent American shareholder activist and from rating agency Moody’s, which moved Petrobras’ credit rating from Baa1 to Baa2 or, in simple terms, from bad investment grade to worse investment grade. The company’s ambitious pre-salt investment plans, falling oil prices, government limits on how much it can charge for petroleum products, and a weaker Brazilian currency were all factors.

Petrobras was not helped as Brazilian voters go to the polls this weekend armed with President Dilma Roussef’s admission that there was corruption at the company and her promise to try to clean it up. Allegations of kickbacks to Petrobras executives in exchange for contracts have dogged the Roussef campaign. The president and her party had tried to deflect the charges. Polls indicate Roussef is in a tight race for a second four-year term.

This is a trick question: how do you make a lawsuit go away? You buy the other litigant in the action. That is just what subsea fluids specialist MACDERMID OFFSHORE SOLUTIONS has done.

SEN reported back in May (31/5) that MacDermid and Niche Products were suing each other on both sides of the Atlantic over the suggested re-formulation of MacD’s HW443 fluid. The litigation will presumably now go away as Niche has been acquired by MacD with the Niche management team remaining in place until the year-end.

So what does this mean? We have no idea, but here is a thought: did MacD buy Niche because it was cheaper than carrying on with the lawsuit? Fascinating.

Offshore