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Online Blackjack News - Chinese Online Casinos
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It's 11 p.m. and inside an office building on the northeastern tip of the Philippines a dozen people place wagers on blackjack and baccarat. No matter how much they bet, none of the gamblers will win anything. These players are all proxy bettors, making wagers on behalf of patrons who track the action and issue instructions from outside the country by way of a live Internet link.
Cagayan Freeport, a 12-year-old special investment zone that includes Santa Ana, is using the gaming provisions in its charter to chase a slice of the estimated $12 billion wagered over the Internet each year. The zone is the first Asian jurisdiction to legalize online casinos, giving it a head start in the race to lure the region's bettors.
The gambling zone targets Chinese gamblers who helped Macau overtake Las Vegas as the biggest casino market last year, said Jose Mari Ponce, chairman of Cagayan Freeport, who rented his office to Eastern Hawaii as a temporary home. Harrah's Entertainment Inc. and MGM Mirage, the largest casino operators, so far have failed to persuade the U.S. Congress to let them take Internet wagers.
``This can succeed over time,'' said Andrew Lee, an Internet gaming analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Group Ltd. in London, of the Cagayan initiative. ``There's no doubt that China has a huge potential to be a very large online gaming nation.''Most Asian countries ban Web casinos, including the rest of the Philippines, Macau, Singapore and Hong Kong. Internet gaming is a regulatory gray area in China. Laws banning gambling were framed before the Internet existed and don't clearly outlaw online casinos, Lee said.
“China's policy is like keeping one eye open and one eye closed,” said Hsu Hwa-min, chairman of iFaFa Ltd., one of about 40 online casinos registered in the Cagayan zone. “The expectation is that eventually they'll opt to regulate this industry instead of losing the business to other countries. By then, the Philippines will have moved ahead.”
The United States is being left behind and will not get on the bandwagon. Congress, which banned Internet casinos, last year curbed payments from banks to offshore operators to stop players using credit cards. However, it is expected that as internet gambling becomes more popular all over the world, then Congree will relent.
Cagayan's proxy bettors may also help attract gamblers who are wary that the electronic games featured on sites based in Europe or the Caribbean may be rigged, said Nadine Javellana, an analyst at Macquarie Securities Ltd. in Manila.
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| Source:
Blackjack2002 News Staff
| Friday, 20 July 2007 |
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