(Bloomberg) -- Twelve first-round bids were made in a court-ordered auction of Citgo Petroleum’s Venezuelan parent, to pay claims brought by creditors of the South American nation. 

The bidders for the refiner’s parent company, PDV Holding, narrowed from an initial list of 30, according to Robert Pincus, the special master appointed by a US district court to lead the sale process, who spoke in a hearing on Tuesday. 

The auction seeks to satisfy more than $20 billion in creditor claims against the Venezuelan government and state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela, which owns PDV. 

The bidders include some oil companies whose Venezuelan units were nationalized, as well as private equity funds, Nathan Eimer, one of Citgo’s lawyers, told US Circuit Court Judge Leonard Stark. 

The size of the bids submitted by the dozen selected companies “have been disappointing,” Eimer added, without elaborating.

All 12 firms signed non-binding indications of interest and will move to a “second round” of the auction, Pincus said. Due diligence with interested firms will take “multiple months,” he added. 

The court will provide a new chart on the process on March 24. 

Citgo’s parent is currently protected from attachment by US sanctions. The buyer would need to obtain a license from the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control in order to complete the purchase. 

--With assistance from Andreina Itriago Acosta and Nicolle Yapur.

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