In March 2024 Vale paid $914.2 million to buy Cemig's 45 percent of Aliança Energia and own the hydro and wind producer outright. A year later it sold 70 percent of the same company to Global Infrastructure Partners. The enterprise value implied by the second sale is lower than the first. The equity value is higher.
Key takeaways
- Vale agreed on 27 March 2024 to acquire Cemig's 45 percent stake in Aliança Energia for a total consideration of $914.2 million, made up of $542 million in equity and $372.2 million of net debt attributable to the stake, taking its ownership from 55 percent to 100 percent.
- Aliança Energia's portfolio at the time of the Vale deal was 1.7 GW, including seven operational hydroelectric plants in Minas Gerais with 1.4 GW of capacity and three wind farms in Rio Grande do Norte and Ceará, with 46.2 MW under construction.
- Global Infrastructure Partners agreed on 31 March 2025 to acquire 70 percent of Aliança Energia for $1.24 billion, made up of $1 billion in equity and $238.2 million of net debt, leaving Vale with 30 percent.
- Grossed up to 100 percent, the Vale purchase implies an enterprise value of about $2.03 billion, or $1.19 million per MW, while the GIP purchase implies about $1.77 billion, or $0.81 million per MW across 2,189 MW.
- As part of the GIP deal, Vale will buy about 70 percent of Aliança Energia's output under dollar-denominated PPAs with no inflation adjustment and an average remaining term of 21 years.
What did Vale buy from Cemig in 2024?
It bought the half of a company it already ran as its own power supplier. Vale held 55 percent of Aliança Energia and was the main user of the electricity it produced. Cemig had made its divestment plan public in 2020, and when its 45 percent came up for sale Vale exercised a preferential right of acquisition, the contractual first refusal a partner holds over a co-owner's shares.
The asset base was mostly old hydro. Seven plants in Minas Gerais accounted for 1.4 GW and a physical guarantee of 755 average MW. Physical guarantee is the volume of energy a Brazilian hydro plant is certified to sell, which is lower than its installed capacity because rivers do not run at full flow all year. Three wind farms in the northeast made up the rest, and the fleet had been operating for 17.5 years on a weighted average basis.
The deal needed approval from Cemig's shareholders and the relevant authorities, and Aliança reported in its 2024 annual report that it had been completed.
Why buy full control and then sell most of it a year later?
Because the purchase was a step towards a platform, not an end point. When it announced the Cemig deal, Vale described Aliança as the base of an energy platform that could take on more assets, and said it intended to seek partners for it.
The terms it set are the centre of the 2025 deal. GIP renegotiated the power contracts between Aliança and Vale. Vale will take about 70 percent of the output for an average of 21 years, at prices fixed in US dollars and without inflation adjustment. The rest of the output will be sold on the market.
For Vale, the sale was about its balance sheet. Enerdatics records that Vale expected a 7 percent reduction in net debt from the transaction. As its chief executive put it: "Vale is not an energy company." Keeping 30 percent and a long supply contract preserves the power without owning most of the company.
How do the two prices compare?
Both deals were for stakes, so both need grossing up to 100 percent before they can be compared. Leap stores the Vale deal at $0.54 million per MW, which divides the 45 percent consideration by the full 1,701.3 MW. Measured that way the stake looks less than half as expensive as it really was. On a 100 percent basis, the Vale purchase implies an enterprise value of about $2.03 billion and the GIP purchase about $1.77 billion.
The equity tells the opposite story. Grossed up, Vale's $542 million implies equity worth about $1.20 billion for the whole company. GIP's $1 billion implies about $1.43 billion. The difference is debt. The net debt attributable to the stakes implies roughly $827 million for the whole company at the time of the Vale deal and roughly $340 million at the time of the GIP deal.
Earnings moved too. Aliança reported EBITDA of $169.85 million for 2023 and $127.27 million for 2024. That puts the Vale deal at about 12.0 times EBITDA and the GIP deal at about 13.9 times. So GIP paid a lower enterprise value for a company earning less, but a higher multiple of those earnings. Both prices are recorded in US dollars at the time of announcement, so part of any gap may reflect the exchange rate rather than the business.
The fleet also changed. Leap records 2,189 MW for the GIP deal, a portfolio that now includes the Sol do Cerrado solar complex, so the two per MW figures measure slightly different companies.
Enerdatics' data shows nine Brazilian hydro M&A transactions from January 2023 to June 2025, eight of them with a disclosed value. On a 100 percent basis, the comparable operating hydro prints run from $0.85 million per MW for ENGIE's purchase of the 612 MW Jari and Cachoeira Caldeirão plants, through $0.88 million per MW for Eletrobras' stakes in Retiro Baixo and Baguari on Enerdatics' calculated net capacity, and $1.00 million per MW for ENERGO PRO's 350 MW Baixo Iguaçu plant, to $1.24 million per MW for Gerdau's 58.3 MW purchase from Atiaia Renováveis. Vale's 2024 purchase, at $1.19 million per MW, sits near the top of that range. GIP's 2025 purchase, at $0.81 million per MW, sits just below the bottom.
What does the deal signal for Brazilian hydro M&A?
It shows how much of an industrial hydro company's value sits in its main customer contract. Aliança's buyer in 2025 was buying 21 years of dollar revenue from a mining group, and it renegotiated those contracts as part of the price. Industrial buyers such as Gerdau have also been adding to their Brazilian hydro positions, and the Aliança sequence shows the other side of that trade: an industrial owner keeping the supply while handing the asset to an infrastructure investor.
It also shows that a lower per MW price is not a lower valuation. Comparing $1.19 million and $0.81 million per MW suggests Aliança lost a third of its value. The equity, which is what changed hands, rose.
And it adds to a pattern of full platform takeovers in Brazilian power, where buyers take control of whole companies rather than single plants. GIP now controls Aliança with Vale as a minority partner and anchor customer, which is the structure Vale described when it first bought out Cemig.
Frequently asked questions
How much did Vale pay Cemig for its stake in Aliança Energia? Vale agreed on 27 March 2024 to pay a total consideration of $914.2 million for Cemig's 45 percent stake, including $542 million in equity and $372.2 million of net debt, taking full ownership.
Who owns Aliança Energia after the GIP deal? Global Infrastructure Partners agreed on 31 March 2025 to acquire 70 percent of Aliança Energia for $1.24 billion, with Vale retaining the remaining 30 percent.
Does Vale still buy power from Aliança Energia? Yes. About 70 percent of Aliança Energia's output is secured by Vale under PPAs with an average remaining term of 21 years, priced in US dollars without inflation adjustment.
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