China’s Dalian Wanda Group has scrapped its plan to take part in the 197 ha Bandar Malaysia project after Beijing clamped down on its funding sources, reported the South China Morning Post.
The Straits Times reported yesterday that nine parties have submitted proposals on how to undertake the massive development, which will house the terminus of the US$5.2 billion (RM22.27 billion) High-Speed Rail connecting Singapore with Kuala Lumpur.
According to Malaysian government officials, the applicants eyeing to become Bandar Malaysia’s master developer consists of two Japanese and seven Chinese companies, with Dalian Wanda not among them.
Previously, when Prime Minister Najib Razak attended China’s Belt and Road Forum in May, he wooed Dalian Wanda’s Founder Wang Jianlin to participate in Bandar Malaysia, saying that the Chinese billionaire would bring “something extraordinary” to the project.
But when he came back to Malaysia, Najib decided to revise the development model with the Ministry of Finance retaining ownership of the land for the mammoth project.
Top Malaysian government officials admitted that they initially wanted to rope in Dalian Wanda, but eventually decided to broaden their options by seeking proposals from Fortune 500 companies on how to develop Bandar Malaysia.
Wang may have decided not to vie for Bandar Malaysia after regulators commanded China’s biggest banks to cut off funding to six of Dalian Wanda’s overseas acquisitions as part of the government’s measures to control capital outflows.
The authorities’ move is also believed to have prodded Wang to dispose most of his hotels and theme parks earlier this month.
On Tuesday, Chinese news agencies reported that the billionaire is silently divesting his Wanda plazas, or his 200 shopping malls in China. This fuelled rumours that Dalian Wanda is still short on cash even after selling 13 theme parks and 77 hotels for 63.7 billion yuan (RM40.4 billion).
The firm later clarified that it was just transferring the ownership of three Wanda Plazas in Liaoyang, Nanchang and Yancheng upon their completion due to earlier agreements it had signed. Based on its 1H 2017 report, 26 new malls are covered by this contract.
Image sourced from South China Morning Post
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