Gambling ban turns Cambodia’s boom town to ghost

[geovalin]

Cambodia’s beach resort of Sihanoukville, which saw a boom in investments in casinos and hotels from China since 2016, is suffering from the fallout of a mass exodus of Chinese after an online gambling ban came into force on January 1 this year.

 

Construction work and casino openings have come to an abrupt halt when Prime Minister Hun Sen unexpectedly announced in August last year that Cambodia would criminalise online gambling. Of 72 casinos in the city, so far four have shut down and 23 have laid off employees, with more than 7,000 workers affected, according to Ministry of Labour officials.

 

And residents expect more to come as there were around 200 online gambling operators prior to the ban, employing more than 200,000 people.

 

read more http://investvine.com/gambling-ban-turns-cambodias-boom-town-to-ghost-town/

 

[sammieuk1]

Well its no good them turning up here for a game of darts or bridge as a consolation prize either ????

[gk10002000]

72 casinos had sprung up?  What a way to ruin a nice area

[ThomasThBKK]

19 minutes ago, gk10002000 said:

72 casinos had sprung up?  What a way to ruin a nice area

and the lives of all locals there that are now left with nothing but unfinished worthless construction projects, empty casinos and destroyed beaches and nature that will prolly never recover. At least the expats there can just move on...

 

And yes, that's the reason why i don't like chinese, indian or whatever mass tourism and thailand should be damn serious about waking the fak up and making it here more sustaintable or the same will happen.

[scubascuba3]

If online gambling is banned how does that impact the casinos in <deleted>sville?

[VocalNeal]

2 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

If online gambling is banned how does that impact the casinos in <deleted>sville?

Because all the money goes offshore?

 

Because the machines are in Cambodia but the actual money and payouts go to/come from somewhere else.

[ThomasThBKK]

7 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

If online gambling is banned how does that impact the casinos in <deleted>sville?

They use these setups for money laundering and getting money out of china mostly.

People place bets online, lose their money but have a deal with the casino to return most of it.

Then their money is outside of china, they go there and pick it up in cash... just one of the shemes, no idea really exactly how everything works in detail but those chinese casinos are mostly fake af and just a front for dirty money.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/australian-officials-helped-chinese-high-rollers-obtain-visas-now-theyre-being-investigated-for-possibly-helping-money-launderers/2019/07/30/9bb405c4-b27f-11e9-acc8-1d847bacca73_story.html

https://globalnews.ca/news/4897032/bc-casinos-money-laundering/

 

It's an issue wherever chinese casinos are, glad they don't have them here.

Edited January 14, 2020 by ThomasThBKK

[charmonman]

I’ve never been there but a friend who used to spend a lot of time there said it was ruined at least a few years ago by the influx of Chinese tourists. Too bad it has also been ruined for the locals.

 

This is the consequence of selling out to the almighty renminbi. May it serve as a lesson to others. Are you listening TAT?

[natway09]

Gambling in casinos has not been banned (mores the pity).

What they have banned are the basically "boiler rooms " on the upper floors telemarketing online gambling. Over 600 Chinese staff gone home already.

As you can tell, I am not a great lover of gambling. Have seen too many families totally ruined.

ATM's in casinos for example are just making it worse

[johnnycthedog]

4 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

If online gambling is banned how does that impact the casinos in <deleted>sville?

 I was in Cambodia 2 years ago.  I visited several Casinos in Sihanoukville out of general interest when staying there.  There was not one game being played that I recognised.

 

Of interest in each place were the well dressed female Cambodian croupiers playing some form of card game not to people sitting at a table but to an very large online computer screen with many players listed across the screen.  As they dealt the cards the players would bet online.  Obviously a line of credit would need to be established with the casino first.  There were several tables in each establishment participating in this online gambling. I was told by a local that one new hotel of some 7 or 8 stories near the beach was fully booked out by Chinese visitors there in town to gamble and mostly gamble online.

 

I was not really happy when I heard the Chinese had recently purchased a large tract of beachfront land there for a massive development exclusively for the Chinese clientele.  And a friend recently returning from Phnom Penh said the city was awash with Chinese development and Chinese visitors.  Just like the rest of SE Asia.

[rodpav]

5 hours ago, ThomasThBKK said:

and the lives of all locals there that are now left with nothing but unfinished worthless construction projects, empty casinos and destroyed beaches and nature that will prolly never recover. At least the expats there can just move on...

 

And yes, that's the reason why i don't like chinese, indian or whatever mass tourism and thailand should be damn serious about waking the fak up and making it here more sustaintable or the same will happen.

I went there in 2004 was a great laid back place 

[ChaiyaTH]

So let's hope the Chinese masses leave, turn the casino's into apartments, make it a nice place to holiday again! 
I planned living there right when the Chinese showed up 2 months later, knew it would be bad so left at that time. Perhaps it will become nice again now.

[VBF]

1 hour ago, rodpav said:

I went there in 2004 was a great laid back place 

It was still a great place in 2013 but since then, "Snooky" has been decimated by the building, mainly casinos for Chinese.   There are several threads running on TV about it - do a search.

Now it would seem that much of it was in vain and it's become a "lose-lose" situation. Sad.

[yellowboat]

7 hours ago, gk10002000 said:

72 casinos had sprung up?  What a way to ruin a nice area

Yes, but maybe it will be as it once was.  It use to be a great place to live. 

[Mac98]

I bet it will get worse. 2-1. Any takers?

[jastheace]

10 hours ago, rodpav said:

I went there in 2004 was a great laid back place 

wasn't it just. nice beach, spread out far and wide,could find half decent food, cold beer.

perfect place to spend a few hour at the beach with a few tinnies and a decent selection of watering holes. was like 3 towns in one.

gone forever.

glad i saw it in 2006, 2007, 2009.

hate to see it now, going by reports.

[daveAustin]

Good news. Hordes of Chinese tourists is one thing, but all this taking over of cities ain't right.

[anicon]

..they have legal gambling casinos in Hong Kong & Macau. why go to Cambodia to gamble?

[Burma Bill]

On 1/14/2020 at 10:15 AM, VocalNeal said:

Because all the money goes offshore?

 

Because the machines are in Cambodia but the actual money and payouts go to/come from somewhere else.

Yes indeed, mainland China, Macau and Hong Kong. Possibly why Huawei is laying a new under sea telecommunications cable between Sihanoukville and Hong Kong (money business center). May now be a "bad move" by the company. 

[RichardColeman]

On 1/14/2020 at 9:44 AM, gk10002000 said:

72 casinos had sprung up?  What a way to ruin a nice area

It's the Thai coffee shop phenomenon 

[phuketrichard]

On 1/14/2020 at 4:17 PM, VBF said:

It was still a great place in 2013 but since then, "Snooky" has been decimated by the building, mainly casinos for Chinese.   There are several threads running on TV about it - do a search.

Now it would seem that much of it was in vain and it's become a "lose-lose" situation. Sad.

HUH: it was ok in 2008/09 ( at least Otres was when papa john lived there)  by 2015 it was heading to <deleted>, a poor mans pattaya with the hill for the really down an out drinkers.

[VBF]

5 hours ago, phuketrichard said:

HUH: it was ok in 2008/09 ( at least Otres was when papa john lived there)  by 2015 it was heading to <deleted>, a poor mans pattaya with the hill for the really down an out drinkers.

Ah, well I first saw it in 2011 so to me it was still good in 2013 but doubtless it was better before then.

 

Like Phuket, which was magic in 1989 but by 2008 was ruined even after the post-Tsunami repairs...as I'm sure you know! ???? 

It all depends when you first visited a place as to how your "scale of ruination" runs - the old "I remember when blah blah" conversation.

[gk10002000]

7 hours ago, RichardColeman said:

It's the Thai coffee shop phenomenon 

Yeah, 7-11, family mart.  Five of each on the same street and in view of each other.

[phuketrichard]

8 hours ago, VBF said:

Ah, well I first saw it in 2011 so to me it was still good in 2013 but doubtless it was better before then.

 

Like Phuket, which was magic in 1989 but by 2008 was ruined even after the post-Tsunami repairs...as I'm sure you know! ???? 

It all depends when you first visited a place as to how your "scale of ruination" runs - the old "I remember when blah blah" conversation.

I dont find phuket ruined at all and i have been here since 85, yea more tourist, more traffic,bit more expensive but more shopping venues, better selection of things,etc etc.

 

 

[VBF]

7 hours ago, phuketrichard said:

I dont find phuket ruined at all and i have been here since 85, yea more tourist, more traffic,bit more expensive but more shopping venues, better selection of things,etc etc.

 

 

I think we've agreed to differ on that before. What I saw in Phuket when I first arrived was a virtually unspoilt tropical island where you had to make an effort to get around.

It was an adventure to get from (say) Patong to Kamala or Surin. As a Hasher there was loads of undeveloped "jungle" to explore.  Sitting on the bus going over the hill from Patong into Phuket town, the view was of green jungle down to a strip of beach, then ocean. THAT's the Phuket I miss, plus you must agree that the attitudes are way less friendly plus it's hardly a bit more expensive - I would say way more expensive.

Different perspectives, I suppose.

Edited January 18, 2020 by VBF

[Monomial]

On 1/14/2020 at 10:11 AM, scubascuba3 said:

If online gambling is banned how does that impact the casinos in <deleted>sville?

 

This is a good question. Not obvious at first, but there are really 2 things at play here.

 

1) As has already been stated, much of online gambling was simply money laundering. The cut the casinos got from this paid for a lot of waste that went into maintaining the image of a thriving business to hide the obviousness of the real source of money.  Even in Cambodia, you at least need some kind of a fiction as a cover story for why you are depositing 2 pallets of cash that came in on a shipping container.

 

2) Much of the space and employment in these casinos was not used for physical gambling. Agents would lease out huge rooms and video equipment directly to people in China. Unlike what Westerners think of as online gambling, Chinese online gambling is more like camgirls, barely dressed and showing their cards among their other assets. The staff would be imported from China, housed at the casino hotel, and entire floors with nothing more than girls standing in front of empty tables with video cameras would be devoted to this business. The independent Chinese agents running these services may never even visit Cambodia. They'd just lease the space and the license from a Snookyville casino. The casinos actually made the vast majority of their legal money from rental fees from these agents. Kill online gambling, and there is just no way physical gambling in the pit can take up all the supply of space.

 

 

[Traubert]

On 1/14/2020 at 11:05 AM, ThomasThBKK said:

and the lives of all locals there that are now left with nothing but unfinished worthless construction projects, empty casinos and destroyed beaches and nature that will prolly never recover. At least the expats there can just move on...

 

And yes, that's the reason why i don't like chinese, indian or whatever mass tourism and thailand should be damn serious about waking the fak up and making it here more sustaintable or the same will happen.

Yeah, after all there's only 2.7bn of them, or 43% of the worlds population. The top economy and the fastest rising.

 

Who needs 'em?

[Traubert]

On 1/16/2020 at 7:31 AM, anicon said:

..they have legal gambling casinos in Hong Kong & Macau. why go to Cambodia to gamble?

Not in Hong Kong, Macao yes.

 

There's a limit on how many are allowed in each day, around 14.5k.

[Lacessit]

On 1/15/2020 at 2:14 AM, jastheace said:

wasn't it just. nice beach, spread out far and wide,could find half decent food, cold beer.

perfect place to spend a few hour at the beach with a few tinnies and a decent selection of watering holes. was like 3 towns in one.

gone forever.

glad i saw it in 2006, 2007, 2009.

hate to see it now, going by reports.

From the sound of it, could become a desirable destination again. I'd suggest all the prices for accommodation and food would come down.

[phycokiller]

On 1/16/2020 at 6:31 AM, anicon said:

..they have legal gambling casinos in Hong Kong & Macau. why go to Cambodia to gamble?

because they get their change back in US$