Indian authorities continue to crack down on gambling operations they fear are originating out of China. 15 different locations have been raided, and Chinese national are accused of running both illegal gambling and online dating rings.

The Times of India reports the Enforcement Directorate also seized Rs 47 crore (approximately $6.38 million) from HSBC Bank accounts tied to the operations. Raids were conducted in Delhi, Gurgaon, Mumbai and Pune on August 28. The entire network is suspected to have collected as much as Rs 1,300 crore ($176 million) from Indians.

The investigation began because the ED noticed payment gateways were failing to report suspicious transactions. “There is a suspicion that, apart from indulging in banned activities like online betting, this network of companies with their reliance on online wallets and their lax regulatory systems could have been used for hawala transactions as well. The ED is in the process of obtaining information from online wallet companies, HSBC Bank, Registrar of Companies etc,” the ED announced.

“With the help of Indian chartered accountants, some Chinese nationals floated multiple Indian companies, initially kept dummy Indian directors to incorporate the companies and later replaced them with Chinese nationals who travelled to India for this purpose,” they added.

There has been a lot of discussion over the years regarding whether or not gaming operators across Europe, and perhaps the world, should all be held to the same list of regulations and requirements regardless of the country or countries they target. This idea hasn’t garnered a tremendous amount of support, partially because of the logistical issues that are implied, but there has still been progress made toward that goal. Gaming regulators in different countries are often joining forces to provide some greater amount of stability to the gaming industry and two more have now connected. Kansspelautoriteit, the gaming regulator in the Netherlands, and the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that will see the two regulatory bodies begin to work much more closely together. 

The MOU will lead to the implementation of communications channels between the two that will allow them to share market data and industry best practices. It will also enable the two countries to collaborate on the shaping of policy and corporate responsibility, while enabling better oversight of the gaming space to prevent it being used as a target for money laundering and other crimes. In a small way, the MOU can also help to eventually create a cohesive gaming industry that spans the entire European Union and, possibly, the world. 

Rene Jansen, the chair of Kansspelautoriteit, says of the new agreement, “I am delighted that agreements with international regulators, like the Malta Gaming Authority, are formalised and captured in Memorandums of Understanding. These MoU’s are a solid basis to share knowledge, to cooperate, and to smoothly exchange information. At the same time operators will be receiving a clear signal that [the] hands of regulators will be joined internationally.”

This isn’t the first time that gaming regulators in Malta have signed MOUs with gaming-related entities. They have entered into several similar arrangements over the years, including one between the Lotteries and Gaming Authority (the MGA’s predecessor) and the Jersey Gambling Commission almost eight years ago. More recently, the MGA signed one with Sweden’s gaming regulator, Spelinspektionen. MGA CEO Heathcliff Farrugia says of the latest agreement, “This MoU with the Dutch Gambling Authority is another step in the right direction, and follows other similar MoU’s which the MGA signed with other regulators over the past years. Our relationship and cooperation with Kansspelautoriteit [have] already yielded tangible results in the past, and with this MoU, apart from formalising such relationship, a stronger collaboration at an international level is also ensured.”

A large party held in a hotel suite at Encore Boston Harbor earlier this month has the Massachusetts Gaming Commission (MGC) taking action to prevent further incidents. The Wynn Resorts property saw more than 100 people gather from August 17-18 in violation of standing coronavirus protection orders, and many of those in attendance were reportedly not wearing face masks as required. Even after an employee raised the alarm, it took an additional three hours for the casino to take action. 

The late-night party reportedly attracted more than 110 people, well above the current cap of 25 Massachusetts now has in place for indoor gatherings. A butler at the property is said to have informed casino higher-ups of the issue, but the response time was much longer than necessary. Word got out to the MGC, which discussed the issue when it met last Thursday. According to MGC Chair Cathy Judd-Stein, “What was most egregious for me was that happened, and our licensee got notice over three hours. And at least one employee, the butler, did exactly the right thing and went and notified his fellow employees to have action taken.” 

As a result, the MGC has already awarded Encore Boston Harbor a notice of non-compliance, and the property has acknowledged that it is working more diligently to prevent similar incidents in the future. It now limits hotel rooms to a maximum of four people, and a maximum of eight in a hotel suite. Bruce Ban, the assistant director of the MGC Investigations and Enforcement Bureau, explains, “They’re getting this under control. Encore seems to be holding fast to their new rules, really sticking to their guns.”

Since the incident, Encore has already kicked out a number of guests for breaking the rules – eight rooms in total were forced to be vacated. The individuals who had rented the rooms have been fined by the MGC, and a number of other pending reservations at the property’s hotel have been canceled. For the August 17 party that started all the commotion, the renter of the room received a $3,000 fine from Encore and a $500 fine and a disorderly conduct violation from the state. The MGC is weighing the possibility of issuing all who attended the party a $500 fine. 

Casinos taking hits to their bottom line is not news this year. The coronavirus has proved to be an extremely powerful enemy to the entire gambling industry, which is suffering some of its worst revenue slides on record. Those companies who had the foresight to properly manage their finances over the years are in much better shape to be able to recover, and those who leveraged themselves too thin are scrambling to figure out how to survive. Landing International Development (LDI), the Hong Kong-listed casino operator behind Jeju Shinwa World in South Korea, has done well with its response to the global pandemic. While it has suffered losses like the rest, it reports that its net loss was only a fraction of what it could have been if it had been slower to react.

According to a filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange from last Friday, LDI saw a net loss of a little more than $102.2 million over the first half of the year. This was 5.2% lower than what was reported for the same period last year, and comes after the company’s aggregate revenue dropped 24.5% in the six-month period. That figure came in at $33.81 million. 

The winning formula included a mix of increased revenue in its gaming operations, decreased operating expenses and the cutting of some leases last year that resulted in LDI not having as much unnecessary baggage. The operator added in its filing, “In response to the decreasing number of cross-border travellers [due to the coronavirus], we concentrated on the local market by offering discounted family packages and promotion events … our enhanced marketing strategy has been rewarded a satisfactory response with improving hotel occupancy rate since May 2020.”

LDI’s gaming revenue, despite the ongoing COVID-19 debacle, jumped 26.6% year-on-year during the first half of 2020, reaching $13.04 million. This caused a gaming business segment loss of $9.16 million compared to the segmental loss of $27.38 million it reported for the same period last year. Non-gaming revenue, however, dropped by a massive 39.8%, only reaching $20.78 million. That decline was a direct result of the attack from COVID-19 and the subsequent loss of traffic at the company’s properties. 

The home of poker legend Antonio Esfandiari has been burgled to the tune of $1 million, it is alleged.

In a report on PokerNews, Esfandiari spoke about the burglary, for which the alleged burglar has been taken into custody, the Las Vegas Review-Journal breaking the news that Svitlana Silva, aged 46, is suspected of taking Esfandiari’s possessions on July 14th.

The alleged burglary appears to have taken place due to Silva obtaining the key codes, possibly from knowing Antonio’s father, Bijan Esfandiari. Silva allegedly took $50,000 in cash, as well as somewhere approaching $500,000 in casino chips, jewelry and – the worst kick of all for the Magician – the famed 2012 Big One for One Drop WSOP bracelet.

Taking the valuables to play in high stakes poker games, Silva undoubtedly didn’t quite perform at the same level Esfandiari might have done, at least early on, suspicions were raised on the back of Esfandiari describing the chips that were taken. With Silva frequenting ARIA and The Bellagio, the police swooped, and as Esfandiari told PokerNews, he believes karma will do its work.

The WSOP Poker Players Championship is the one they all want to win, but while many suspected it might be the chip leader heading into the final table’s time to shine, Jason Koon, the final didn’t work out like that. In the end, German high roller Christian Rudloph took the victory and $1.8 million top prize to go with the Chip Reese Trophy.

This being the pandemic-inspired GGPoker-based WSOP 2020 Online Series, there was no celebratory champagne being popped and no camera bulbs to flash that winning moment into poker history. Christian Rudloph won’t care one bit about that, however, as he came from being third in the chipcounts when play began to overhauling tough players in every spot at the final table.

Winning the $50,000-entry Poker Players Championship in Las Vegas is a feather in the cap of any player. This year the buy-in may have been halved to $25,000, but the bragging rights are just as valuable, and beating such a strong final table from 407 total entries – meaning a prizepool of just over $10 million – is a huge achievement for the German player.

By far the biggest win of Rudolph’s career did not come easy. With an average stack at the start of the final table comprising just 23 big blinds, stacks were shallow and the action in such poker-shark infested waters was predictably large. It would, however, take 20 minutes for Aliaksei Boika to bust in 9th place, the Belarussian running an all-in with ace-five into Shankar Pillai’s ace-jack, which held.

The popular poker player and prop bettor extraordinaire Mike ‘Timex’ McDonald took plenty of action way back at the start of lockdown when he pitched the prop bet of him shooting 90 out of 100 ‘free throws’ in basketball. Months later, McDonald took to Twitter and Twitch to show the world that he had achieved this lofty goal… only to walk into a prop-betting war of words with Nick Schulman.

Live poker may not be taking place everywhere, but since lockdown began, there have been prop bets everywhere, from the consumption of chicken nuggets to how many WSOP online bracelets a player can win. We’ll let you guess which of those two applies to GGPoker’s Daniel Negreanu.

One of the most interesting bets, however, came in a sport not usually linked with poker.

Basketball.