Chinese company to buy U.S. movie theater chain AMC

Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group Co. announced this morning it’s buying a major U.S. cinema chain—AMC Entertainment Holdings—for $2.6 billion in China’s biggest takeover of an American company to date. The Beijing-based company says the deal will create the world’s biggest movie theater operator. AMC’s American management will remain in place, with headquarters to stay in the Kansas City area, and AMC’s 18,500 employees won’t be affected. Founded in 1988 and privately owned, Dalian Wanda Group operates hotels, department stores, tourism businesses and other interests, and says it had 2011 revenue of $16.7 billion. The company counts 86 theaters in China among its assets. Dalian Wanda says it will invest an additional $500 million in AMC’s development. AMC operates 346 cinemas, mostly in the United States and Canada. There are just five AMC theaters in Louisiana, according to its website, though none in Baton Rouge. The deal is the third-largest Chinese corporate investment in the United States, according to financial research firm Dealogic. It ranks behind investments by Beijing’s sovereign wealth fund, the China Investment Corp., of $5 billion in Morgan Stanley and $3 billion in Blackstone Group, both for minority stakes in 2007. Chinese companies had invested $34.8 billion in the United States by the end of 2011. Globally, outbound mergers and acquisitions by Chinese companies total $16.8 billion so far this year, up 6% from the same period last year. The Associated Press has the full story here.