TOKYO, Feb 4 (Reuters) - Japanese trading house Sumitomo Corp has quit the shale oil business in the United States by selling its stake in a project in the Eagle Ford during the October to December quarter of 2020, a company spokesman said on Thursday.

Sumitomo bought a 100% stake in 2018 in a field in the Eagle Ford formation of southern Texas that was set to have peak output of 3,000 barrels of oil euqivalent per day.

It purchased the stake despite hefty impairment losses on its previous U.S. shale gas and oil assets in 2014-2015 when slumping prices forced international energy companies and Japanese trading houses to writedown the their assets.

Sumitomo decided to sell the stake last year, the company's last shale gas and oil asset, the spokesman said, without giving a reason or a sum for the deal.

Sumitomo also sold its entire stake in a Marcellus shale gas project in the U.S. for a undisclosed sum in 2020.

The latest deal was reported by the Nikkei business daily earlier on Thursday.

(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)