Chinese offshore oil and gas major said it had filed an arbitration claim to establish a right over Hess' stake in the giant Guyana oilfield Stabroek in the event of the U.S. firm's sale to Chevron.
CNOOC filed the arbitration application on March 15, following a similar move by its other Stabroek partner Exxon Mobil, Xu Yugao, CNOOC's board of directors secretary, told an earnings briefing late on Thursday.
"We have a joint operating agreement with partners regarding the Stabroek block. We will deal with relevant issues based on the relevant arbitration terms," Xu said.
Exxon, the operator of Stabroek, holds a 45% stake, while Hess has 30% and CNOOC 25%.
Exxon and Chevron are in talks over Exxon's claim that it has a right of first refusal on any sale of the Stabroek block, a giant field off the coast of Guyana that contains at least 11 billion barrels of oil.
Stabroek is the prize in Chevron's $53 billion bid for Hess. It is the site of the largest oil discoveries in almost two decades and is expected to produce more than 1.2 million barrels of oil and gas per day by 2027.
CNOOC on Thursday reported a 12.6% fall in its 2023 net profit due to weakening oil and gas prices, but record production driven by domestic fields in Bohai Bay and overseas operations in Guyana and Brazil helped the result.
(Reuters - Reporting by Chen Aizhu in Singapore and Colleen Kristen Howe in Beijing; Editing by Jamie Freed)