INDUSTRIAL and Commercial Bank of China Ltd (stock code: 601398), the world's biggest by market value, has agreed to buy 79.9 percent of Macau's Seng Heng Bank for 4.68 billion patacas (US$582 million).

The Beijing-based bank will buy the stake in the city's second-largest lender from billionaire Stanley Ho's Sociedade de Tourismo e Diversoes de Macao, it said in a filing to Hong Kong's stock exchange yesterday. Credit Suisse Group advised the sellers. STM is the biggest casino operator in Macau, the only Chinese city where such gambling is allowed. The company bought Seng Heng in 1989, the Financial Times reported on Friday.