Hebei China Fortune have confirmed that they only paid €5.55 million for Javier Mascherano, refuting reports in Spain that the Barcelona veteran cost them €10 million.
As Goal revealed earlier this month, Manuel Pellegrini's side are reluctant to pay more than €5.77 million, which would trigger a 100 per cent levy on the payment for the transfer.
Following protracted negotiations, they eventually managed to convince the Blaugrana to accept a fee that kept them under that mark.
"Transfer dealings are no different than doing normal business. Just like shopping in a market," club general manager Fu Qiang told China's state-run Xinhua News Agency.