Inside Asian Gaming

August 2009 | INSIDE ASIAN GAMING 45 Briefs ChiliPoker, Winamax, BetSafe, PafPoker and PokerLoco will also provide online qualifiers. Sponsors of the side events and collaterals include the Hong Kong Game Club, an organisation that hosts ‘free play’ poker tournaments in private clubs all around Hong Kong. Other sponsors are: DafaPoker; Dafa888; The Poker King Movie; JBet, PartyPoker. com; BWin, Zipang Casino; 777babycasino and PKR. Chinese currency goes international There was a momentous day recently for China’s currency, the yuan, when the first cross-border yuan trade settlement deal was completed. It’s still a long way from that to seeing settlement in yuan being available for online business or for VIP casino gamblers to be able to take large amounts of yuan legally across the land border with Macau for settlement of their gambling tabs. Nonetheless, the deal is symbolic of China’s very gradual movement toward being plugged into the international financial system. China’s State Council announced in April a pilot programme to allow exporters and importers in Shanghai, and those in southern Guangdong in Shenzhen, Zhuhai and Dongguan—cities next door to Macau and Hong Kong—to settle cross-border trade deals in yuan. There may be potential for the new cross border settlement system to be abused. Someone could for example set up a shell company in Macau ostensibly for cross-border trade in products or services with Guangdong companies but in reality use it to funnel large amounts of yuan to feed high rollers’ casino playing habits. Looking up Down Under for Bally Bally Technologies says it will draw on its experience of serving slot customers in Asia in formulating its strategy for a re-entry into the Australia slot market. “That’s probably the single most important plan for us [in the Asia Pacific region] to execute over the next 12 to 18 months,” Cath Burns, Vice President & Managing Director, Asia Pacific, tells Inside Asian Gaming . Miss Burns has developed an enviable reputation for delivering success after steadily helping Bally build its Macau market share over the last few years. “Australia is the largest gaming market in Asia Pacific, so it’s an entry that we will get right,” she adds. “We look at Australia [as a market] the way an Australian company would look at Nevada. Entering [the] Nevada [market] isn’t something you would do at a week’s notice. You would be foolish to do so. “Australia is a mature gaming market with 200,000 machines. So when you go into Australia you are setting up a full scale operation to meet the market needs. You’re designing product, you’re implementing specific protocols. It’s something you want to get right the first time,” she explains. Bally, which will announce its results for the second quarter of 2009 to 30th June shortly, says the company is well placed to serve Australian customers—in part because there are already a lot of ethnic Asian slot players in Australia. “The experience we’ve had in the region serves us well to go into a market such as Australia,” explains Ms Burns. “There are some parallels between the player here [in East Asia] and the player in Australia.” Korea move Jin Air, a South Korean domestic carrier, is to start direct flights between Korea and Macau four times a week from 29th October. Jin Air currently operates only domestic flights between Seoul and Jeju, and Busan and Jeju. “For Macau, no Korean carrier is operating there currently, so we’ll open the route to the city that is emerging as a family resort destination,”Kim Jae-kun, president and CEO of Jin Air, said in a press briefing in Seoul, according to a report in Korea Times. The airfares of the international flights will be about 70 to 80 percent of those offered by full service carriers, Mr Kim said. Macau International Airport