Wanda denies plan to buy Printemps Department Store Paris

Commercial property developer Dalian Wanda Group on Friday denied that it intends to buy French luxury retailer Printemps Department Store Paris.

Ding Yao, general manager of Wanda Department Store, told NetEase that the company "does not have any plan" to buy Printemps Department Store Paris, the news portal said.

French magazine Challenges said earlier that the Wanda Group was interested in Printemps Department Store Paris, and was mulling an offer of about 1.6 billion euros ($2.11 billion) for the company, NetEase said.

Wanda Department Store, a retail unit of the Wanda Group, is one of the largest business drivers for the group. It has 42 branches in China, and had 6.93 billion yuan ($1.10 billion) in revenue last year.

The group has been expanding overseas. This year, it invested $2.6 billion to buy AMC Entertainment Holdings, the United States second-largest movie theater company.

In five years, China is set to become the world's second-biggest market for luxury goods after the United States, overtaking France, the United Kingdom, Italy and Japan, a Euromonitor report said in October.

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