Seoul: POSCO Holdings Inc., the holding company of South Korea's leading steelmaker POSCO, has sold its entire stake in a Chinese stainless steel joint venture for around 400 billion won (US$291 million), industry sources said Wednesday.

According to Yonhap News Agency, POSCO Holdings had signed a preliminary deal to sell its 82.5 percent stake in the Zhangjiagang Pohang Stainless Steel (PZSS) steel mill to China's Qingshan Group, the top stainless steelmaker in the country.

PZSS, established in China's eastern Jiangsu province in 1997, has an annual capacity of 1.1 million tons. Recently, the steel mill has been experiencing losses due to an oversupply in the market and an economic slowdown in China, which is the world's second-largest economy.