Wanda Group did not appear in the bidding list for the US $10 billion project in Damascus, Malaysia.
On July 25th, Singapore's Straits Times quoted unnamed government sources as saying that the Malaysian government had received nine tenders for the real estate project in Bandar Malaysia, which are divided into seven Chinese companies and two Japanese companies. The seven Chinese companies are China Construction, China Gezhouba Group, Greentown overseas Development, Vanke, China Communications Construction, China Resources Group and Australian engineering company John Holland, a wholly owned company of China Communications and Construction, and the two Japanese companies are Daiwa Housing Group and Mitsui Real Estate.
According to the report, the amount of development planned in the tender is between US $7 billion and US $10.5 billion, and the project will include the terminal of the high-speed railway between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur at a cost of more than 50 billion ringgit.
It is worth mentioning that these seven Chinese companies are all state-owned enterprises.
Wanda Group, which has previously discussed the project with the Malaysian government, is not on the list.
As of press time, thepaper.cn did not receive a response from Wanda Group.
Wang Jianlin, chairman of Dalian Wanda Group, said in an interview with CCTV at the "Belt and Road Initiative" International Cooperation Summit Forum on May 14, "if nothing happens, Wanda will land two projects with a level of more than 10 billion US dollars this year. One is Damascus in Malaysia, and the other is in Indonesia, which is still under discussion. "
Wang Jianlin previously announced in an interview with the Financial Times that he would refocus on China's domestic market.
Wang Jianlin's announcement of talks with the Malaysian government on the project came ten days after the Malaysian government announced the replacement of the original partners of the project, Yihai Holdings and China Rallway Co., Ltd.
Malaysia's requirements for bidders are open only to Fortune 500 companies, and the company's revenues have totaled 50 billion yuan in the past three years, the Straits Daily reported.
The report also mentioned that the railway project, valued at US $5.2 billion, is part of Belt and Road Initiative's global infrastructure construction project.
Originally, the Damacheng project belongs to China Railway and Yihai Holdings.
However, a statement issued on May 3 by TRX City Bhd, a subsidiary of Malaysia's Ministry of Finance, said that the acquisition consortium, including China Rallway, had failed to meet the criteria under the agreement reached in December 2015 and could not complete the deal, meaning that the agreement with China Rallway and IWH-CREC, a consortium formed by Yihai Holdings, on the sale of a 60 per cent stake in Damascus expired. The reason is that IWH-CREC did not fulfill the payment agreement, so the Damascus equity deal with a total value of 7.4 billion ringgit (about 11.7 billion yuan) fell through.
The Malaysian Ministry of Finance will now retain ownership of the site and begin to look for other potential developers who are interested, TRX said in its statement. Subsequently, IWH-CREC issued a notice saying that TRX City unilaterally invalidated the agreement on the sale of shares with a 60 per cent stake in Damascus, in violation of the terms of the agreement, and that they reserved all rights to it.
The announcement said that the company has sufficient funds and capacity to ensure the smooth development and implementation of the Damascus project, and that IWH-CREC also has to fulfill all payment obligations under the agreement. Malaysia said China Rallway and Yihai needed to produce sufficient evidence to fully prove three things, including how much they paid, when they paid, and the agreed terms of payment.
The Wall Street Journal previously quoted an internal document from the Malaysian Ministry of Finance as saying that one of the main reasons for the collapse of the deal was that the Chinese government had not approved the investment by China Railway. At the same time, IWH-CREC was granted 12 extensions, with the last extension due on April 30th.