Tycoon held over gambling ring

Eleven people, including tycoon Alvin Chau Cheok-wa, are still being held by Macau police after being arrested on Saturday for alleged illicit operation of a gambling, money laundering and criminal syndicate.

The Directorate of Judiciary Police said yesterday that it received intelligence in August 2019 about an illegal gambling syndicate run by a 47-year-old mastermind, who is a Macau businessman named Chau.

Officers did not directly name Alvin Chau, but the Suncity Group's chairman matches the alleged mastermind's surname and age.

It also came as an arrest warrant was issued by Wenzhou Municipal People's Procuratorate in Zhejiang on Friday for Chau, chairman of Macau casino junkets operator Suncity Group Holdings.

Macau police said that according to intelligence, the syndicate had set up overseas gambling platforms via its VIP junkets in the "Monte Carlo of the East."

The gang was also said to have recruited mainland residents for illegal online gambling. The illegal earnings were then transferred and covered up via VIP gambling accounts and underground banks.

The case has been handled by a special unit since last April.

Along with Chau, 10 others aged from 30 and 57 years who all claimed to be senior administrative officers, were also arrested on Saturday in several residences in Macau.

Those arrested admitted to establishing the overseas gambling platform, but refused to cooperate in revealing more details, police said, adding that nine of them were under detention.

An online photo showed Chau driving his Porsche to a police station to assist with investigations on Saturday.

Officers confiscated computers, servers, electronic storage devices and three million patacas (HK$2.9 million) in the raids.

As for whether the Macau operation was related to the Wenzhou's case, Macau police said the operation was carried out based on its own intelligence gathering efforts and communications with law enforcement around the world.

The police also said it did not have relevant information on the mainland investigation, adding that everything would be done in accordance with Macau law and legal procedures.

This came as the Wenzhou police said on Friday that as of last July, a cross-border gambling syndicate allegedly led by Alvin Chau had a network of 199 shareholder-level representatives and more than 12,000 gambling development agents, with a network of some 80,000 gambling members in the mainland.

The mainland judiciary body urged Chau to surrender as soon as possible, and said that if he did so, it might be possible for him to apply for leniency.

On Saturday afternoon, the government information bureau of Macau issued a press release, saying that the administration had received a notification from mainland authorities concerning a Macau ID holder surnamed Chau, who is a shareholder as well as a principal of a gaming promoter company.

The statement said the information from mainland authorities revealed that Chau had allegedly set up a cross-boundary gambling syndicate, and illegally organized Chinese residents to travel to VIP junkets overseen by Chau that were located outside the mainland to take part in cross-boundary gambling.

"Such activities concern a huge amount of capital, and seriously hamper the country's management of social order," the release read.

While Macau authorities did not provide the full name for Chau, the statement mentioned the arrest warrant issued by Wenzhou Municipal People's Procuratorate on Friday for Chau, chairman of Macau casino junkets operator Suncity Group Holdings.

Back in 2019, Suncity was singled out by state-backed Chinese media which attacked online gambling for causing what it described as great harm to China's social economic order.

Suncity group later held a press conference, with Chau saying that it did not operate online gaming platforms that promote gaming and conduct monetary settlements in the mainland without physical gambling chips.

Shares of Suncity Group Holdings fell 7.27 percent to 25.5 HK cents on Friday, the lowest in nearly five years.

This came as the blue-chip Macau casino operators Sands China (1928) and Galaxy Entertainment (0027) also plunged by around 7 percent amid concerns over the new Covid variant.

Sun Entertainment Group said that its board of directors was aware of the Wenzhou investigation against Alvin Chau and is assisting the Macau police's investigation.

But the company said the news reports were about Chau's personal affairs.