COSCO's OOIL sells Long Beach terminal to Macquarie for $1.78 bln

SHANGHAI, April 30 (Reuters) - Orient Overseas International Ltd (OOIL) said on Tuesday it has agreed to sell its Long Beach container terminal to a subsidiary of Australia's Macquarie Group for $1.78 billion.

The Hong Kong-based shipping line last year said it would sell the container terminal after it was taken over by China's COSCO Shipping Holdings Co .

COSCO had agreed with the U.S. government to do so in order to gain clearance for the $6.3 billion deal.

OOIL said it expects to book an estimated gain before tax of about $1.29 billion from the sale of the terminal to Olivia Holdings, majority-owned by a fund run by Macquarie Infrastructure and Real Assets, which in turn is part of Macquarie Group.

Shares in OOIL jumped more than 4 percent to their highest level since January after the company announced the sale.

Jefferies analyst Andrew Lee said in a note OOIL had received an "attractive price" for the terminal and believed it could use the proceeds to issue a special dividend. The company said it had yet to decide what it would do with the money.

(Reporting by Brenda Goh; editing by Sonali Paul)