COSCO to sell assets to avoid losses

China COSCO Holdings Co has agreed to sell part of its assets on the Chinese mainland to its parent company, China Ocean Shipping (Group) Co, a global shipping provider, for 3.73 billion yuan ($605 million), according to an announcement by China COSCO on Thursday, the Wall Street Journal reported.

This marks the third time that China COSCO sold assets this year in a bid to avoid making losses for three consecutive years.

This may lead to automatic delisting from the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

The company plans to sell 81 percent of the stocks of two of its asset management companies to COSCO (Hong Kong) Group Ltd, a subsidiary of China Ocean Shipping.

These two asset management companies have key properties in Shanghai and Qingdao of Shandong province.

China COSCO stands to gain 3.67 billion yuan from the sale, which experts said may help to bring the company back in the black.

It registered 990 million yuan in net losses in the first half, lower than 4.87 billion yuan at the same time last year thanks to one-off proceeds from asset selling.

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