Mexico City - AFP
Mexican oil company Pemex on Friday announced a third-quarter loss of more than $4.3 billion, as well as a continued drop in production.
The $4.32-billion loss was 52.5 percent greater than that registered in the same period a year earlier, according to a Pemex statement.
Pemex has seen huge losses since last year as its oil production has steadily dwindled.
In the third quarter, crude production averaged about 2.4 million barrels a day, which is 4.3 percent less than in the third quarter of 2013, a company executive, Luis Ramos, said in a phone call with investors.
A decade ago, production was at 3.4 million barrels a day.
To boost energy production, the Mexican government has launched a sweeping overhaul of the energy sector, ending the 76-year-old state monopoly on oil drilling and reopening the sector to foreign companies.
Pemex, the world's seventh-largest oil producer, announced losses of $4 billion in the second quarter.
In 2013, total losses were $12.8 billion.