Wanda Hotel units changes ownership in $469m deal

Wanda Investment Holding, a vehicle wholly controlled by Chinese billionaire Wang Jianlin, has acquired a 65 percent stake in Wanda Hotel Development Co. from Wanda Commercial Properties Overseas, which is majority owned by Wang.

The sales price is $469 million.

The move is expected to improve the balance sheet of Wanda Commercial Properties, which wholly owns Wanda Commercial Properties Overseas. It is part of a planned asset reshuffling that Wanda first announced in August, selling stakes totaling nearly $4.5 billion in real estate projects across the United Kingdom, United States, China and Australia. This is in response to the Chinese government rule on cross-border deals.

Recently, Wanda Properties sold the $4.5 billion in real estate projects in China, Australia, London and Chicago to Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties.

And Wanda Properties sold its domestic theme park and hotel assets to Sunac China Holdings and Guangzhou R&F Properties in a $9.4 billion transaction in July 2017.

In other news, in September, Wanda Hotel Development announced plans to buy Wanda Hotel Management from Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties for $112.4 million. According to Reuters, the firms are in talks regarding the structure and terms of the acquisition.

Wanda Hotel Management operates 65 hotels in China, and has been contracted to manage and operate 13 more, which are under construction and which are owned by third parties, including two being built in Malaysia and Turkey.