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Vietnamese Game of Chance Drives $2.7 Billion In Revenue Before Getting Shut Down
By Shane Addinall Jun 04, 2020 LegalityThe Hanoi Police uncover an illegal online gambling operation that drives billions in revenue and attracts millions of players with only a single game – could this get Vietnam to consider regulating?With most countries around the world either regulating online gambling, opting for a state-owned monopoly or simply adopting a no-harm no-foul approach to the activity it is easy to forget that there are regions where online gambling is strictly illegal.
Rich Forbidden Fruits
In countries such as Cambodia, Lebanon, Singapore, South Africa, the UAE and Vietnam online gambling is strictly forbidden and those who offer to gamble to residents of these countries face harsh penalties.
That being said, however, these regions are also known to have rabid fan bases who perhaps due to the taboo nature of online gambling are willing to invest large sums of money, enough to make it worth the risk to service them.
Vietnam Cracks The Whip
While it is often difficult to quantify the value of these black market casino regions as neither players nor operators are want to share their revenue figures a recent sting operation by the Vietnamese Police gave an interesting insight in the why people are willing to risk up to seven years in jail.
A sixteen-person app-based gambling operation was bust by the Hanoi Police and the forensic analysts have uncovered revenues in excess of $2.7 billion (€2.3 billion). The so-called casino operation did not offer a full suite of games only a single game of chance described as being “an online gambling game that resembled slot machines”.
Given Vietnam’s firm stance on illegal online gambling the sixteen members of this illicit operation face fines of up to $2150 as well as jail terms ranging from three to seven years.
A Ravenous Marketplace
According to a report by the Hanoi Police, the game was launched in 2018 and evaded them due to its servers being based outside of Vietnam.
The most interesting fact they shared in this report was that while the operation had been running for less than 2 years, only offers a single game of chance and had to spread by word of mouth and underground marketing it had “signed up millions of gamblers”.
With such a gambling ready population regulating or even creating a state gambling monopoly could be an invaluable revenue source for the Vietnamese government while channelling gambling spend back into the local economy.
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