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RIO DE JANEIRO, Nov 11 (Reuters) - Brazilian engineering group Novonor is close to reaching an agreement to sell most of its controlling stake in petrochemical firm Braskem to IG4 Capital, four sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. Sign up here. Under the potential deal, IG4 would fully acquire Novonor's debt while the conglomerate would retain a small stake in Braskem, according to two of the sources. In a call with journalists to discuss the firm's third-quarter results, Braskem executives declined to provide comment on the matter, and said they were not participating in any ongoing negotiations. Novonor currently holds 50.1% of Braskem's voting shares and 38.3% of its total shares, while Petrobras owns 47.0% of voting shares and 36.1% of total shares. Reuters reported in August that IG4's talks with key stakeholders had progressed since the firm signed exclusive rights to acquire billions of reais of Novonor's debt from Brazil's largest banks, including state development bank BNDES. A deal between the firms could also resolve the outstanding debt hanging over Novonor, formerly known as Odebrecht, which ballooned during the Car Wash corruption scandal about a decade ago, when the group pledged its Braskem shares as collateral for 15 billion reais in bank loans. The debt has since grown to close to 20 billion reais. A new controlling shareholder - and a potential injection of fresh capital - could breathe new life into Braskem, which has struggled with tight margins in the petrochemical business and lingering liabilities from neighborhoods damaged by its salt-mining operations under the northeastern city of Maceio. Braskem reported on Tuesday a 26 million reais ($4.81 million) net loss for the July-September period, narrower than the 592 million reais net loss reported a year earlier. ($1 = 5.4039 reais) Reporting by Luciana Magalhaes and Rodrigo Viga Gaier; Additional reporting by Alberto Alerigi; Writing by Isabel Teles and Fernando Cardoso; Editing by Gabriel Araujo and Leslie Adler
