Odds against side-betting

Side-betting “generates a direct erosion of the tax revenue”. So says Portuguese Public Prosecutor Hugo Luz dos Santos who recently published ‘The Gaming Legal Framework in Macau, SAR: An Overview’ and who spoke to Macau Business about the loss in revenue from the scheme and further necessary steps for regulation of the city’s gaming industry.
Side-betting (also known as a multiplier) involves “agreements between a third party and a patron” in which the amount bet is only a fraction of the actual amount, which remains concealed: the nominal value is not the real value. The effect of this is an untaxed parallel betting scheme that is still conducted through official casinos, following the rules of the games.
This scheme, although a “relatively old phenomenon” in the MSAR as well as common “amongst all casino cities” is frequent in the territory, notes dos Santos, suggesting that, aside from the current measures being taken by the authorities to handle the “opaqueness and limited regulatory [oversight]” legal measures should be sought.
Among this would be a registration system of “all credit lenders and all credit borrowers in the casinos of Macau,” at least as one of the measures to drive towards “the indirect methods of assessing the tax base,” notes dos Santos. The author also points out a number of other regulatory measures, “in the Macau Government’s best interests” and aimed at maintaining the long-term sustainability of the MSAR’s gaming industry.
Read more in this month’s edition of Macau Business, on shelves now! Original article by João Paulo Meneses