The office of Brazil's federal prosecutor this weekend offered J&F Group, the holding company holding a majority stake in JBS, to pay a €3bn fine in six-monthly instalments over the next 13 years, prosecutors said in a statement.

They added that the proposed negotiated fine represents 6% of the group's pre-tax revenue in 2016 and 64% of its projected operating profit (EBITDA) for this year. The prosecution argued that it was entitled to seek 10% of revenues in fines, but knocked down most of it in the light of "effective collaboration" in the investigation by J&F executives, including brothers Joesley and Wesley Batista.

They and five other J&F executives agreed to pay €62m in personal plea bargains last week. The individuals also agreed to co-operate and hand over tapes of conversation containing evidence of alleged corruption at the highest level of Brazil's political establishment.

There is a significant amount of work to be done in order to regain the trust of our stakeholders

Tarek Farahat replaced Joesley Batista as chairman of JBS last week after his resignation amid the ongoing scandal. “Governance is my utmost priority," said Farahat. "We will work hard to restore trust with the market and protect the more than 235,000 families that are part of JBS. There is a significant amount of work to be done in order to regain the trust of our stakeholders,” he added.

The prosecution also revealed that the Operation Greenfield task force investigating thousands of alleged illegal payments to politicians had refused five previous offers for negotiated fines from J&F ranging from €200m to €2.2bn.

By making all these details public, the office of the prosecutor gives the appearance of a final offer to its latest €3bn proposed deal to settle the case out of court.

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