Oklahoma City-based leisure company, Six Flags, has announced it is to sell seven of its eight European theme parks to a private investment firm for around $200m (£111.5m) – just months after it declared it had no intention of selling any of its assets.

The troubled company also said it had sold its Worlds of Adventure park in Cleveland, Ohio, to Cedar Fair for $145m (£80.8m). The deal includes the adjacent hotel and campsite, but not the animals currently located at the park.

The news marks a dramatic turnaround in the company’s strategy.

Six Flags is now left with just one amusement park in its European portfolio – the Warner Bros. Movie World in Madrid, Spain, which it helped found.

Kieran Burke, chair, said: “While we continue to believe that there are potential internal and external growth opportunities in Europe, the sale of our European operations will enable us to focus our management and capital resources more completely on our North American operations.”

The company issued a statement, saying that it will use the cash from the sales to cut its debt, which has soared to around $2bn (£1.12bn).

Six Flags has recorded full-year losses for the last five years, with 2003 seeing the company return a net loss of $61.7m (£34.4m)

“While we will incur a book loss in the first quarter of 2004 – on the sale of these assets – of around $290m (£161.7m), these transactions are very positive for us,” said Burke.

“We expect to utilize the proceeds of the sales primarily to reduce our debt and to fund our existing parks. We do not expect any additional park disposals to occur.”

In 1998, Six Flags acquired six European parks from Walibi for $155m (£84.2m) and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange the same year.

Its initial success story was halted in 2000 however, when the company recorded its first decline in visitor numbers – a downward spiral it has been unable to revert.

Six Flags, which will subsequently operate a total of 31 parks in North America and Europe, has so far declined to name the buyer for the European parks, its is believed the purchaser is new to the industry, with no previous assets or interests in the leisure sector. Details: www.sixflags.com