Illegal gambling in Korea has ballooned by more than 40 percent from 2008 to $66 billion last year, according to the National Gambling Control Commission.

The surge partly stems from increased sports betting and gambling in private homes, the commission said.

Opinions are mixed as to solutions for illegal gambling, which pumps large amounts of money through the underground economy. Some support harsher crackdowns while others advocate for legalization and taxation. 

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JAMES Packer has hit back at claims his proposal to build a super-casino at Barangaroo would "cannibalise operations" at The Star, saying his rival had failed to deliver "a world-class, integrated resort".

In a blistering attack on The Star's value to the Sydney circuit, Mr Packer said he didn't feel "anyone truly believes that Sydney is a better place because of it".

Alicia Wood  -  The Daily Telegraph

"Over the last 24 months, Echo have declared time and time again that when their $870 million redevelopment of The Star was complete, Sydney would have a world-class, integrated resort and shareholders a 14 per cent return on investment," he said. "Unfortunately, neither of these promises appear close to reality."

Mr Packer's broadside comes just days after Echo Entertainment moved to stage two of the government's unsolicited proposals process, seeking to extend their exclusivity agreement beyond 2019.

In a bid to prevent Mr Packer from opening his rival casino, Echo promised the state government it would invest hundreds of millions of dollars to spruce up casino assets, so long as its exclusive licence was extended beyond 2019.

Both casino proposals are being considered by David Murray, the former chairman of the Future Fund.

But despite the promises of further investment, Mr Packer said no amount of money could transform The Star into a world-class, integrated resort.

"Unfortunately for Echo, it's located in the wrong part of the city, doesn't properly access the waterfront and therefore can't take advantage of Sydney Harbour," he said.

"Crown's proposed hotel resort at Barangaroo is perfectly positioned to maximise its harbour location and breathtaking views. It will bring thousands more Chinese tourists to Sydney that otherwise wouldn't visit. We are happy to put our track record on tourism up against Echo's and believe Crown can give Sydney a luxury hotel it truly deserves."

Crown has commissioned four leading international architecture firms to design a $1 billion casino hotel tower Mr Packer says will be the most iconic building in Sydney since the Opera House.

In its submission to the Australian Stock Exchange, Echo last week detailed its position as the "fastest-growing, international VIP gaming facility in Australia".

The Star's international rebate VIP revenue had grown by 87 per cent to $226 million from 2010 to 2012. Echo also added it would include investments in local transport in any revamp of its Pyrmont site.

Premier Barry O'Farrell said last week only one of the two casino proposals would win.

"(Echo Entertainment) has argued it would be better to have one person in this space rather than two competitors if the state is to maximise the tourism and other potential from the integrated resort," Mr O'Farrell said. "Both of these proposals will be considered under the same process because both can't proceed."

Echo chairman John O'Neill declined to comment.

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MOSCOW, April 15 (RIA Novosti) - Moscow police have shut down an illegal casino operating on the premises of a state university, the Interior Ministry reported on Monday.

The police confiscated four card tables, three roulette tables and 70 slot machines with counterfeit Novomatik software, and other gambling paraphernalia from the site.

The casino, located at Moscow State University of Instrument Engineering and Informatics, was seeing a daily income of 3 to 5 million rubles ($96,700-$161,000), the police said.

Since July 2009, gambling in Russia has only been allowed in four specially allotted zones, driving much of the business underground into a thriving black market.

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The central government’s mouthpiece China Daily reported on Friday that Beijing was imposing “new rules for Macau gambling trips”. But several gaming analysts say the rules are actually not new, and are downplaying its impact on the Macau gaming industry.

In a short report published on the English version of its website on Friday, China Daily said that people who organise trips with more than 10 mainlanders to come to gamble in Macau, and profit from such trips, will be charged in the mainland with the crime of gambling, in line with Chinese Criminal Law.

Why not check out the "gaming page with this and other stories from Asia at  www.macaubusiness.com

China Daily said the Ministry of Public Security made the statement on Friday.

Actually, the ministry made the statement in a written reply to an online question sent to an officially sanctioned forum, asking whether mainland residents could face any charges back home for gambling in Macau.

U.S.-based brokerage firm Sterne Agee says it doesn’t see the statement as “overly disruptive”, analyst David Bain wrote in a note issued yesterday.

“One Macau contact suggests the above law was already imposed in 2005 when the Greek Mythology casino … began organising shuttle buses from Guangdong to its facility,” Mr Bain wrote.

“Another knowledgeable contact agrees, and suggests the bulletin could be in response to an aggressive stance some operators took on grouping customers on the newly completed Guangzhou/Zhuhai rail line,” he added.

Wang Changbin, an associate professor at Macau Polytechnic Institute’s Gaming Teaching and Research Centre, told gaming intelligence provider Gambling Compliance that the ministry’s statement largely repeated the status quo.

“I don’t think the response of the Ministry of Public Security has significant meaning for Macau’s gaming industry. It just reiterated the previous provisions,” he said.

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Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd’s funding of its Philippines casino venture will be by private placement rather than public offering, according to a term sheet seen by Dow Jones Newswires. It says the exercise seeks to raise US$377 million by selling about 1.1 billion shares.

The money will go toward the fitting out and management of the Belle Grande Manila Bay casino resort being developed jointly with Filipino Chinese businessman Henry Sy.

Private placements of stock – usually to sophisticated investors such as fund managers and high net worth individuals – typically have a lock up period preventing investors from taking short-term profits. Disclosures about risk are fewer than in a public offering.
A finance industry source told Business Daily: “This suggests Melco Crown has had very strong interest.”

Melco Crown (Philippines) Resorts Corp. – an off the shelf Manila-listed entity formerly known as Manchester International Holdings Unlimited Corp. – will use the cash toward the US$1 billion cost of the already part-built scheme.

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The first casino in Cape Verde will start operating within 21 months on Sal Island, under the terms of a gaming and gambling concession and exploration contract signed Friday by the archipelago’s government and Royal Casino, the Cape Verdean press reported.

The casino on Sal Island is expected to cost 5 million euros, and the overall project to cost 66 million euros. The concession contract gives Royal Casino a 25-year exclusive concession.

Cape Verde’s Tourism, Industry and Energy Ministry, Humberto Brito, said that Royal Casino would be subject to strict rules, “very restricted, controlled and supervised,” in order to prevent illegal gambling.

The minister announced that the government was negotiating gaming and gambling licenses in other areas, namely Santiago Island, where contracts are due to be signed with interested investors.

Since 2012 Cape Verde has had three gambling areas on three islands: Sao Vicente, Santiago and Sal.

The Cape Verdean government considers the introduction of gaming and gambling in Cape Verde to be a factor that will drive demand for the archipelago as a tourist donation, creating new business opportunities for the companies operating in this sector, either directly or indirectly. (macauhub)

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MASSACHUSETTS  -  Casino Panel Considers Opening Southeastern Mass. License
CBS Local - The Mashpee, which has proposed a resort casino in Taunton, issued a statement and launched radio and TV ads in advance of a scheduled ...

ARIZONA  -  No end in sight to litigation over casino proposed near Glendale
Arizona Republic - Virtually every move the Tohono O'odham Nation has made to build a West Valley casino has gotten tangled in lawsuits and legislation

MASSACHUSETTS  -  Mashpee Wampanoag turn up pressure on gambling commission
Boston Globe - State lawmakers created the freeze in 2011 to give the tribe first shot at casino development in the region. Proponents of ending it say the Mashpee Wampanoag ..

PENNSYLVANIA  -  Table game revenue sets record in March
The Sunday Dispatch-by Andrew Seder - Pennsylvania's 11 casinos set a record as they generated $67.4 million in gross revenue from table games in March, buoyed by a 25 percent year-over-year ...

ONTARIO  -  Toronto city hall casino debate attracts a hundred people
The Toronto Observer - Toronto's Executive Committee met with around 100 different residents Monday April 15, with wildly differing opinions on the potential casino for downtown 

INDIANA  -  More talks coming over Indiana casino proposals
14 News WFIE Evansville  -  The Indiana House has passed a bill making tax changes to help the state's struggling casinos amid greater competition from neighboring states, but the debate ...

MONTANA - INDIANA - More talks coming over Indiana casino proposals
14 News WFIE Evansville - The Indiana House has passed a bill making tax changes to help the state's struggling casinos amid greater competition from neighboring states, but the debate ...

MONTANA - Construction begins on hotel near Northern Winz Casino
KRTV Great Falls News - Construction has finally begun on a hotel at the Northern Winz Casino south of Havre on Highway 87. The hotel was first announced two year ago. In the last ... Northern Winz Casino Webpage
KRTV Great Falls News - Construction has finally begun on a hotel at the Northern Winz Casino south of Havre on Highway 87. The hotel was first announced two year ago. In the last ... 

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Electronic or virtual table games at the Resorts World Aqueduct racino in Queens are vastly outperforming live table games at top casinos in Atlantic City, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Aqueduct’s electronic games generate $3,943 in “net win” casino revenues per table per day.

Live table games at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut grab $2,831 per table per day, and those at the Borgata in Atlantic City haul in $2,774.

The Sands in Pennsylvania yields $2,861, and the Horseshoe casino in Ohio rakes in $2,293.

By CARL CAMPANILE - Last Updated: 3:07 AM, April 15, 2013 - New York Post

“The demand for electronic table games has been so consistently strong that we have more than doubled the number of baccarat, craps, sic-bo and roulette stations since December 2011,” said Resorts World spokesman Stefan Friedman.

Alain Woinski, president of Gaming USA Corp., said one reason Aqueduct’s virtual games are outpacing the live ones is that the Queens racino has a large number of Asian customers.

That well-heeled demographic has historically been known to flock toward virtual games.

“I don’t want to say that they could put carnival games in there,” Woinski said, “[but] they could add even more games and do even better.”

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In Philadelphia, Las Vegas developer Steve Wynn is proposing to build a waterfront ­gambling resort with a distinctive hotel tower of bronze glass.

Any similarities between that project and Wynn’s proposal for the Mystic River waterfront in Everett are purely intentional, the billionaire casino builder said in a globe interview Friday; he just really likes that design.

By Mark Arsenault | GLOBE STAFF I www.bostonglobe.com  

“It is the same hotel tower; I make no bones about it,” said Wynn, who modeled the Philadelphia and Everett proposals after a hotel he built in Macau, China. “I love that look. It’s a signature tower. And I don’t apologize for it.”

Wynn also disclosed Friday that he has completed negotiations with Mayor Carlo DeMaria of Everett on a deal spelling out the payments the developer would make to the city to offset the possible negative effects of the resort development, such as traffic. Wynn is apparently the first casino developer in Massachusetts to complete a host-community agreement, a key milestone required by state law before any company can win casino development rights.

“It’s a lot of money and it’s done,” Wynn said of the deal. He did not disclose the terms.

Wynn intends to explain the terms of the agreement to ­Everett residents in a letter ­expected to go out next week.

City residents will vote as soon as mid-June on whether to allow the project. No casino project can win a license unless it first wins the endorsement of residents of the host community in a referendum.

The similarities between the Philadelphia and Everett projects have brought some carping from Wynn opponents, who say the twin towers belie Wynn’s boast that each of his projects are custom-designed for their sites. The casino builder, who has designed some of the best known hotels along the Las ­Vegas Strip — such as Bellagio, The Mirage, and the Wynn and Encore resorts — has said he tailored the Everett proposal specifically to the odd-shaped property, extending a long promenade for shops and restaurants down a narrow peninsula that juts into the river.

Wynn has repeatedly used a similar bronze “glass curtain wall,” such as in the Wynn and Encore in Las Vegas. He said he has become convinced that a curtain wall design gives hotel guests “the best experience” by maximizing views and natural light, even though the style limits a designer’s ability to add decorative features to the building.

“I have always looked for a glass curtain wall that suited our purpose,” he said. “One of the things that happens with glass is that the wavelength of the light affects the color palette on the inside of the room.” Adding common gray and blue tints to the glass tends to flatten the warm colors in the interior, he said.

“Whereas when I pick bronze, a glass color that I favor a lot, it heightens the richness of the warmer tones that I use in our interiors. And it makes people’s skin look prettier; people look more attractive in rooms that have warmer light. So that affects my decision on the glass curtain wall.”

Wynn is competing for the sole Greater Boston casino ­resort license with Suffolk Downs, in East Boston, and Foxwoods, which has joined a casino venture in Milford.

Wynn is nearly finished building a scale model of the full Mystic River development, which he will present in Everett in coming weeks, he said.

A spokesman for DeMaria could not be reached Friday evening.

Mark Arsenault can be reached at marsenault@globe.com. ­Follow him on Twitter ­@bostonglobemark.

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The security clampdown for the Olympics put off high rollers at the nearby Westfield Stratford City shopping centre’s giant casino in East London.
With car parks closed and access restricted, many gamblers preferred to go elsewhere, said owner Aspers UK last week. The casino, Britain’s newest, has traded strongly since opening at the end of 2011 and saw business bounce back after the Paralympics.

By By SARAH BRIDGE - thisismoney.co.uk

However, its latest results show that the group made a loss of £4.6million on a turnover of £47.5million for the year to June 30, 2012, due in part to higher gaming duty and a £1.7million hit on the closure of its Swansea club.

Now the group, which also owns casinos in Northampton and Newcastle, is preparing for the opening later this year of its casino in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, the second since the tough 2005 Gambling Act, as well as trying to increase customer spending with a loyalty scheme. It is also planning the launch of an online casino.
The group used to own the Mayfair club Aspinalls but sold it in 2010 to the Australian gaming operator Crown Limited.

Read more at the Daily Mail
Follow them: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook 

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The former Portuguese colony is fashioning a plan to attract tourists beyond its famous casinos.

Pansy Ho has a confession to make. Hong Kong's richest woman might have built her fortune on the phenomenal rise of Macau, China's very own gambling mecca, but don't expect her to take a seat at the baccarat tables or slot machines of her own moodily lit casinos. “I don't play,” she says with a rueful smile. “I'm a terrible gambler. I don't know half the rules and I'm not really patient enough to sit through hours of gaming.”

JAMES ASHTON in the INDEPENDENT     

Her approach might not be such a surprise. After all, whoever heard of a bookie or a croupier with a gambling habit? And Ms Ho, 50, has had all her life to become inured to the lure of piling everything on red in smoky rooms where it is forever night time. She is the daughter of Sir Stanley Ho, known as the "King of Gambling" for turning a once-sleepy Portuguese colony into a glitzy tourist hotspot that today generates five times the gaming revenues of Las Vegas.

One of 17 children from four wives, Ms Ho's emergence as her father's most likely heir now sees her spearhead a new plan: to make Macau appeal to more than just high rollers and Hong Kong day trippers. If she gets it right, the Monte Carlo of the Orient, which has suffered from tales of a dark past and mafia links, will enjoy a very bright future.

Looking beyond gambling for income is a move that almost contradicts Macau's make-up. Half of the jurisdiction's economy is derived from games such as blackjack and Fan Tan, or betting on horses and dog races. It is still the only place in China where table gaming is legal. But Ms Ho and the other industry players don't want tourists to spend less at the tables – they just want them to spend more elsewhere on their stay.

"We want to broaden out: we want to have the shows, the music, the retail experience, maybe even certain themed attractions," says Ms Ho, without wanting to compete directly with Disneyland Hong Kong across the water. So even though Macau has left Vegas trailing in its wake, it sounds as though she wants to emulate the famous Strip where Cirque du Soleil and Celine Dion play for months at a time.

Her eye is also on something closer to home, though. "We need to find ways to bring to Macau something interesting, maybe not unlike what Abu Dhabi is doing."

We are talking on the 45th floor of the Etihad Tower in Abu Dhabi, where delegates to the annual World Travel & Tourism Council summit can marvel at the emirate's Saadiyat Island project, which is creating a cultural quarter from scratch – with its own version of the Guggenheim museum and Louvre gallery – due for completion by 2020.

Macau's bright lights already draw 28 million visitors a year, and many more are expected when a road bridge linking the city to Hong Kong opens in 2017 and light rail adds a further connection to a high-speed line to Guangzhou. That infrastructure will be matched by new hotels that are being thrown up fast.

"One aspect of what everybody is keen to explore, is that in five years' time Macau will have 40,000 hotel rooms, close to Hong Kong but still really a much smaller place, so what do we provide when people come to visit?" Ms Ho asks.

"By taking into consideration the new infrastructure it is a possibility we can continue to grow the capacity, and therefore grow the visitor numbers very healthily. We don't believe the Chinese government will allow for excessive or incessant double-digit growth, but we believe they will also maintain a certain growth level that is commensurate with the investment activities."

Ms Ho is a surprise in person. Far from the expansive showmen such as Steve Wynn and Donald Trump that have led other casino groups, she is short and demure, dressed simply in shades of beige with an emerald pendant; a bleeping pink mobile and glass of orange juice set before her. Despite her wealth, the divorcee has joked to friends that her jewellery collection includes some of her best investments. If that is the case, she must have some impressive gems, because a joint venture she struck with MGM Resorts in her own right helped her personal fortune to soar to $3.3bn (£2.2bn) when it was floated two years ago, according to Forbes.

All the American casino chains have flocked to Macau since its gaming industry was opened up to competition a few years after the colony came under Chinese rule in 1999. As the monopoly operator for 40 years up to that point, the family's Sociedade de Jogos de Macau (SJM) casino company threatened to be overrun. Instead, it has prospered, still running nearly half of the casinos. One plus was Ms Ho's MGM deal, which has just won planning permission for a second casino.

"It has been a good success," she says. "Partially the reason is if we continued to operate from the standpoint of being the old guard and the past operator then it would be difficult for us from our own perspective to appreciate what it means for the new operators. Precisely how do we then go and represent to the government why there should be a balance, because we would always be perceived as the one left behind, on the defensive end."

The family's empire is split into three: Shun Tak, which houses huge swaths of Macau property, the ferry operator to the island and hospitality operations; SJM, the gaming assets including the Grand Lisboa casino; and then the MGM joint venture, which is Ms Ho's preserve. All three are listed, with varying degrees of family control.

Ms Ho emphasises that her father, now 91, who reportedly made his first fortune smuggling goods during the Second World War, has limited involvement in the day-to-day running of the companies. "He is not as active as in the past because he is no longer attending to the operational business side," she says. "My father is more obviously a leader who is respected by everybody, and he still provides his own views, but I think that the businesses are actually now quite independently run."

If there is anything to stop the progress of Macau – now, like Hong Kong, a special administrative region within China – could it be the lingering fear over the island's dark reputation of violence and money-laundering associated with Macau from days gone by? "No, it has cleaned up," Ms Ho says firmly. "We don't see any of that happening."

Some Americans have proved harder to convince. MGM gave up on its assets in Atlantic City three years ago when New Jersey gaming regulators found Ms Ho to be an unsuitable partner for the company. The family has denied links to organised crime, and MGM has since been given permission to reapply for its gaming licence in the state.

Most of Macau's controversy centres on the so-called "junket operators" who recruit, transport and often underwrite the high rollers that step into the casinos. Mainland residents can only transport so much money out of China each year, so that presents middlemen with a chance to act as financiers – as well as to collect debts too.

"We see a lot more discipline now, in terms of the regulatory environment. The junket operators now have a chance in a proper manner to build their own business and relationships with the gaming operators," Ms Ho says.

And even if the chips are down, don't expect her to be tempted to the tables.

Tables turned: Dip in high rollers

Fewer VIP customers because of mainland China's slower economic growth limited Macau's increase in gaming revenues to 14 per cent last year. The $38bn (£25bn) haul doesn't sound at all bad, until you consider that sales rose 42 per cent a year earlier. The Monte Carlo of the Orient overtook takings in Las Vegas six years ago. The ratings agency Fitch suggested recently that the good times will carry on rolling. It revised up its forecast for Macau's gaming revenues this year, saying it expects the VIP segment to grow 4 to 5 per cent and the mass market to soar by 20-25 per cent.

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Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s reference to triad organised crime gangs in testimony in a lawsuit has hit a raw nerve in Macau, the - Chinese boomtown in that his Las Vegas NV Sands Corp helped transform from a gangland haven in to a $38 billion gambling capital.

The lawsuit against Sands was brought by Hong Kong businessman Richard Suen, who is looking for $328 million he says he is owed for helping the - U.S. firm get one of three coveted casino licenses in Macau, now the - world’s biggest gambling market with annual yearly revenues more than six times Las Vegas’s.

Adelson’s comments about triads reverberated across Macau this week & prompted a former Sands partner, casino controller Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd, to post a regulatory filing with the - Hong Kong stock exchange objecting to “certain inaccurate statements”.

Sands & Galaxy jointly won a Macau casino license in 2002, yet they failed to reach an operational agreement & split up. Adelson, 79, when asked in a Las Vegas NV court why the - two firms could not work together, responded in that Galaxy “had expressed their judgement they were going to do business with either reputed or triad people & we couldn’t do that.”

That comment, which drew little attention in Las Vegas, was front-page news in Macau 'cause it suggested China had failed to clean up the - violent gangs in that dominated the - gambling scene a decade ago. Triads involved in Macau’s VIP gaming rooms were notorious for their heavy-handed methods of collecting on gambling debt. Macau’s VIP segment, where rich Chinese wager millions, accounts for around 70 % of total revenues.

A Galaxy spokesman asserted the - company was looking for legal advice & could not comment further.

Interviews with seven Macau gaming executives, in addition to four former Sands employees, revealed a sense of dismay in that the - trial, watched locally online & tracked closely in the - daily papers, was drawing attention to a seedier side of Macau in that China has sought to scrub. The city wants to position itself as a transparent & reputable tourist destination.

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Good government demands that you have clear laws, which are either uniformly enforced or taken off the books. Though the law should provide enough flexibility to allow for common sense, it cannot be arbitrary. It was clear that Internet cafés were only legal because people had found a way to use an unintended loophole to get away with something clearly meant to be against the law. But now that the loophole has been closed, we should get back to the original debate about gambling and where and when it should be legal.

Published Sunday, April 14, 2013 12:11 am
by Dennis Maley

In actuality, the entire issue is a good example of how not to govern. It was clear from the beginning that these businesses didn't pass the smell test. They got to engage in a highly-regulated industry (casino-style gambling), without being subject to the same regulations. As such, they were rife for corruption. But by deliberately turning a blind eye to the operations, lawmakers sent the wrong signal, allowing the industry to grow, while more and more people invested their money in such operations.

By mid-2011, Pasco Sheriff Chris Nocco began busting such facilities, shining a spotlight on the practice, which had managed to fly largely under the radar in a state with everything from bingo parlors to blackjack within a convoluted system of legality. The state should have either squashed the loophole then, or legalized the concept and put them under the same sort of rules as the others. But politics being politics, that's not as simple as it sounds.

At the time, Florida was about to engage in an epic battle over expanding its very limited “Vegas-style” operations, which began with a 2009 deal in which the Seminole Indian Tribe received a license for blackjack in its casinos, in exchange for loaning the state $1.1 billion over two years. By 2011, other companies were pushing hard to expand such operations. Last year, the legislature looked poised to pass a limited expansion that would create a Department of Gaming Control and allow for three major, Vegas-style destination casino resorts.

The Las Vegas Sands Corporation was the main player behind the push for expansion, though they were soon joined by the Malaysian group, Genting Americas. Genting, who is involved with Foxwoods and the Seneca Niagra Casino, bought the Miami Herald's historic waterfront complex for a reported $236 million in 2011, with intentions to build a 500-room luxury hotel, condo towers and a $2 billion upscale "Monte Carlo-style" casino.

The whole process turned into a fiasco as Disney mounted a major push to kill the expansion, joined by the Seminole Indian Tribe, who threatened to withhold gaming revenues, since the move would seemingly violate their compact with the state. The fact that lawmakers were being asked to regulate the internet cafés just added to the mess. Originally, it was thought that they could simply be tucked into the deal and regulated through the new bureaucracy. But when the expansion bill floundered, it was back to square one.

Without a big score, the legislature did what it does best – nothing. The cafés did the smart thing and ponied up some scratch, sprinkling more than a million dollars around Tallahassee. What all that money appeared to buy them was another year of hemming and hawing – not to mention another election cycle in which they could curry favor.

Enter Allied Veterans, the Jacksonville-based company that took in over $300 million in its 49 parlors across the state. Masquerading as a non-profit that helped homeless veterans, Allied got swept up in a massive investigation that resulted in 60 arrests on charges ranging from illegal gambling to fraud and conspiracy. Lt. Governor Jennifer Carroll, who worked for the group while serving in the state legislator, resigned almost immediately and suddenly lawmakers were singing a very different tune, especially when word started to get out how many of them had cashed campaign checks from Allied and its people.

The investigation has exposed a number of flaws in the sitting-on-their hands approach employed by the legislature. First, the fact that these businesses were unregulated gave them a very unfair advantage over the rubes who dumped their money on them. Gambling devices in regular casino operations have to be set in a way that regulators decide is fair to the participants in terms of their chances of winning. Investigations into Allied and other groups are revealing that because the games take place on a computer with off-site servers, the values, outcomes and frequencies can very easily be manipulated. It seems that payouts as a percentage of revenues were much lower than typically is the case. Hence the piles of cash some of these places were racking up.

That being said, it's estimated that 14,000 people were employed by such operations, all of whom will be joining the ranks of the unemployed. I can't help but think that regulating them would have been the better way to go. Personally, I've never understood the appeal of gambling and have no interest whatsoever in casinos. I grew up in a part of Pennsylvania where bookies and shylocks were as routine as insurance men and garage mechanics, so I have seen first hand the debilitating effects of degenerate gamblers on a family and community, but I've also seen that gambling is a vice that exists with or without the endorsement of the law. I also watched as PA sat by idly, as droves of senior citizens hopped buses to Atlantic City every weekend, dropping their hard-earned dollars into the Garden State's coffers.

At the end of the fay, Florida has gambling, and it has just about every kind there is. To allow it in some places and not in others, does nothing but pick winners and losers based on who has the most sway in Tallahassee. People spending their money on goods and services that employ other people is what makes a market economy. Many of the Floridians with disposable income to throw around happen to be retirees, and many of them like to gamble. If they want to throw some coin down the toilet at a local slot machine house, I say let them do it – especially if the money spent puts thousands of Floridians to work. At a minimum, lawmakers should find a way to integrate such small, local casinos into the regulated industry of gambling and welcome the economic impact in entails.

Dennis Maley's column appears every Thursday and Sunday in The Bradenton Times. He can be reached at dennis.maley@thebradentontimes.com. Click here to visit his column archive. Click here to go to his bio page. You can also follow Dennis on Facebook.

Ontario, the second largest province of Canada is about join other Canadian provinces such as British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick and Quebec, in offering online casino gambling entertainment to legal-aged Ontarians. The government-owned Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) is all set to modernize Ontario’s entertainment offerings. It has already selected Boss Media AB, a subsidiary of UK-based Spielo G2 (formerly known as GTECH G2), from among the bidders who participated in a competitive public procurement process.

OLG awarded a five-year contract for Spielo G2 to provide not only a selection of casino table and video slot games, but also to institute player protection and responsible gaming features by way of Spielo G2′s Gaming Management System. The system includes back office facilities for OLG, player-account management services, self-exclusion options and a system that allows interactive players to manage one’s spending limits.

Spielo G2′s selection as OLG’s primary provider does not come as a surprise, since the firm is also the service provider for the Canadian Poker Network. The latter is the first and only legal online poker network in North America, which operates under the helm of the British Columbia Lottery Corporation and Loto-Quebec.

The OLG plans to launch its online gaming services by late 2013 via PlayOLG.ca website and in several phases, with online casino games and video slots as its initial offerings. The government-owned gaming website will also include online lottery services, as this will make it easier for lotto enthusiasts 18 years of age and above, to purchase tickets and check their numbers against lottery results. Thereafter, OLG’s subsequent game offerings will be for online poker, online sports betting and online bingo.

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Anguilla

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Antigua & Barbuda

Aruba 

The northern highlands province of Ha Giang has announced plans to build a casino on top of rock highlands region that has been recognized as a UNESCO Global Geological Park.

As reported in the Thanh Nien News

Representatives from the Ha Giang People’s Committee said at a meeting Thursday in Hanoi that the casino will be part of a 2.72 square kilometer center that will include hotels, restaurants, resorts and other amusement options, all to be built by 2020.

Only foreigners are allowed at casinos in Vietnam.

The announcement means that interested parties can start applying to invest in the project.

Sen Chin Ly, vice chairman of the province, said at the meeting that the project had been approved by the Prime Minister, as a tourism and "preservation" project aiming to promote the geological park, and help locals escape poverty.

Vietnam News Agency said deputy PM Nguyen Thien Nhan complimented the plan at the meeting, calling it a milestone for socio-economic development in the highlands.

The Dong Van highlands (encompassing more than 2,300 square kilometers) is currently home to more than 250,000 people from 17 minority groups, 70 percent of whom are H’Mong.

It was named a global geological park in 2010, due to its status as a hub for ethnic minority culture as well as its value for historical studies about the formation and development of the Earth's surface.

It is widely recognized as one of the most beautiful -- if not the most beautiful -- places in Vietnam.

Limestone can be found in 11 layers on 80 percent of Dong Van's land area and two of layers are sediment dating from 400 to 600 million years ago. It is the second geological park in Southeast Asia, after Langkawi Geological Park in Malaysia, and the 54th in the world.

The title has drawn more tourists to the highlands, 302,000 in 2011 and nearly 400,000 in 2012. The first quarter of this year has seen nearly 140,000 people visit the highlands.

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     Gaming Technology Conference 

March 12-13, 2013 - Las Vegas, Nevada

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Canadian Responsible Gambling Council Discovery 2013 Conference

Apr 14 - 16 - Westin Harbour Castle - Toronto, Ontario 

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BingoWorld
May 7-9, 2013
Biloxi, Mississippi

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     Southern Gaming Summit
May 7-9, 2013
Biloxi, Mississippi

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     Midwest Gaming Summit
June 3-4, 2013
Rosemont, Illinois

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     Host Development Conference
July 22-23, 2013
Las Vegas, Nevada

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     Casino Marketing Conference
July 23-25, 2013
Las Vegas, Nevada

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     Table Games Conference
November 18-20, 2013
Las Vegas, Nevada

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WAWARSING, N.Y. — Spirits were high Thursday evening as supporters of the new Nevele resort project from throughout Ulster County gathered in the hotel’s ballroom to celebrate the project’s potential and rally for state approval of a casino at the site.

Michael Treanor, managing partner of the resort’s new owner, said the gala was intended as a “thank you” for supporters and as a coming-out party for the Nevele.

“We’re heading into a critical period where the state is going to be making some determinations as to where destination casino-resorts are going to go, and it’s very important for us that Ulster County is selected in that process,” Treanor said.

For the Nevele to operate a casino, the state Legislature and Gov. Andrew Cuomo must agree to put a referendum before voters this fall to allow gaming on non-Indian land in New York; voters must approve the referendum; and state leaders must choose the Wawarsing hotel as a casino site.

Treanor said he hopes to restore an economic anchor in the community that will create jobs and attract tourists.

Ellenville Mayor Jeffrey Kaplan said the project is a must.

“We need the Nevele,” said Kaplan, whose village is a stone’s throw from the Nevele. “It is a vital cog of our community, and without it, we can’t really get that start to rehab the area from what happened during the recession.”

The Nevele last operated as a hotel in the summer of 2009, and its closing compounded the Ellenville-Wawarsing area’s loss of manufacturing jobs over the past decade.

Ulster County Executive Michael Hein said a casino at the Nevele would add to the “rebirth” of upstate New York’s economy — “a rebirth acknowledging that there are 22 million people who live in the metro New York area and want to come here, to acknowledge there are 50 million visitors to the metro New York area who would love to come to a family resort like this. We’re talking about a rebirth of Ulster County.”

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The head of the Las Vegas Sands (LVS) business unit in China said he expects higher revenue this year at the company's casinos in Macau.

Sands opened a new resort last year and has expanded its resorts, which should attract more guests and gamblers, Sands China CEO Edward Tracy told Bloomberg News.

Tracy sees Macau revenue growing in the mid-teens in 2013, topping the 2012 growth rate.

Sands shares were up less than 0.5% in afternoon trading on the stock market today.

Officials in Macau, the world's top gambling destination, earlier this month said total gambling revenue for the district rose more than 25% in March to nearly $4 billion. That was the highest monthly figure ever.

In April 2012, the company opened Sands Cotai, its latest multi-billion-dollar Macau resort.

Sands Cotai features more than 600 rooms and suites under the Conrad hotel brand and 1,200 Holiday Inn rooms.

Meanwhile, mogul Sheldon Adelson, the chairman of Sands, was on the witness stand during the week testifying in a suit brought by Hong Kong businessman Richard Suen, who claims he's owed $328 million for helping the company win a license to operate in Macau.

Adelson told a jury he did not authorize an offer reportedly made by former Las Vegas Sands President William Weidner to Suen. Adelson added that he "would not have approved this," Bloomberg News said.

In the U.S., casinos got a boost Wednesday as the Nevada Gaming Board said gambling revenue increased 15.5% vs. a year ago in February. Sands' Las Vegas rivals MGM Resorts International (MGM), Wynn Resorts (WYNN) and Caesars Entertainment (CZR) all edged up.

Nevada said revenue for the Las Vegas Strip alone soared 31.2% to $696 million.

On Friday, MGM and Wynn shares were up about 1%.

Caesars, which operates in Las Vegas and other U.S. locales but not in Macau, dipped slightly Friday.

Melco Crown Entertainment (MPEL), a Hong Kong casino company that competes in Macau but not Las Vegas, rose 1%.

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• Fears of piracy and privacy issues with Google's wearable computer
• Bars have already banned the headwear, months before it goes on sale

By DANIEL BATES

People wearing Google Glass eyewear could be banned from strip clubs, cinemas and casinos because their owners don’t want them filming there.

Bosses for establishments in the US said that due to privacy concerns they would be asking anyone wearing the glasses to remove them or they won’t be let in.

Lap dance clubs said that they would treat Google Glass wearers the same as anyone caught filming a stripper - and would kick them out.

Casinos said they could help cheaters to win unfairly and cinemas said that they could be used to illegally record films and sell pirate copies.

Parks departments and banks across America are also waiting to see how the new technology is used before deciding whether or not to ban them, NBC reported.

Google Glass has caused concern because it has a camera next to the wearer’s eye which can take photos or record video without a red light or a shutter sound to tell others that it is working.

The glasses, which cost $1,500 a pair (£980), are currently on limited release but will be more widely available later this year.

Peter Feinstein, managing partner of Sapphire Gentlemen's Club in Las Vegas, said that patrons will be asked to check the eyewear when they come in.

He said: ‘We've been dealing with the cellphone videoing and the picture taking over the years and we are quick to make sure that that doesn't happen in the club.

‘As the sale of (Google Glass) spreads, there'll be more people using them and wanting to use them at places such as a gentlemen's club.

‘If we see those in the club, we would do the same thing that we do to people who bring cameras into the club.

‘If they don't want to check it, we'd be happy to give them a limo ride back to their hotel’.

A spokesman for MGM resorts, which owns the MGM Grand Casino in Las Vegas, said that picture-taking was ‘frowned upon’ inside its properties.

He said: ‘Security officers on duty ask individuals not to take pictures for the privacy of others in the casino.‘This new product is nothing new in terms of a challenge for us, because for so many years, the very tiniest of portable lipstick and pinpoint cameras have been around.’

Regal Entertainment Group, one of the largest cinema chains in the US, added that no recording devices were permitted into its cinemas.

People wearing Google Glass style specs have already been subjected to ‘cyber discrimination’ in France.
University of Toronto computer engineering professor Steve Mann was at a McDonald’s restaurant in Paris when he claims an employee tried to physically remove a similar gadget he designed from his head.

He wrote about it in a blog post which sparked calls from tech website TechCrunch to boycott the fast food chain.

Read more: Daily Mail
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook 

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