Dalian Wanda buys control of China online payments firm

Beijing

CHINA'S Dalian Wanda Group Co, whose real estate arm just raised about US$3.7 billion in a Hong Kong share sale, said on Friday that it has bought a controlling stake in 99Bill Corp, a Chinese third-party payment processor similar to PayPal.

China's biggest commercial property developer did not say how much it paid for the stake, which marks its first acquisition in the Internet finance sector, but sources familiar with the deal told Reuters that it may have spent more than two billion yuan (S$424.9 million).