BP has increased to US$40 billion the amount it wants to raise from an asset sale programme in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the Sunday Times newspaper reported.
The $40 billion figure is an increase from the previous goal of $30 billion as the British oil giant has forecast that the environmental disaster will cost it a total of more than $30 billion.
The target figure reportedly includes the planned sale of its $20 billion, 26% stake in North America’s largest oil field, Prudhoe Bay in Alaska, which is on the market.
“They’re being very clear. For the right price, they’ll sell,” an unidentified source told the Sunday Times.
The paper also said BP was in talks to dispose of up to $9.2 billion of international assets to TNK-BP, its Russian joint venture.
To date BP has spent around $8 billion battling the huge Gulf of Mexico spill that followed the Deepwater Horizon explosion off the Louisiana coast in April.
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