3 Other forms of gambling: Horse Racing

Other than casinos, there is betting at the Macau Jockey Club and the dog-racing Canidrome.

Horse-racing mainly takes place every tuesday and saturday or sunday at the race-course on the Taipa Island of Macau. The race-course has an area of 450,000 square metres and 18,000 seats for gamblers, and is open only for people over 18 years of age.

The Macau Jockey Club was formerly the Macau Trotting Club. In 1991, it was acquired by a consortium led by Dr Stanley Ho. The Macau Jockey Club is one of the LARGEST private employers of Macau with around 1,400 employees and around 1,100 part-timers.

Some statistics for horse racing in Macau

Year	Number of Visitors	overall betting turnover
89/90	268,561	462,642,000
90/91	305,957	637,308,000
91/92	349,845	979,940,000
92/93	353,730	1,296,616,000
93/94	324,953	1,296,133,000
94/95	367,185	1,521,334,000
95/96	376,487	2,285,331,000
96/97	352,440	2,635,168,000
97/98	369,957	3,421,173,000
98/99	325,444	3,576,040,000
99/00	306,319	3,567,430,000
00/01	284,569	4,019,742,000
01/02	330,298	3,263,321,000
02/03	308,168	3,297,540,000

Statistics show that there's a dramatic decrease in overall betting turnover since 2001. It is mainly due to the influence of internet gaming, which is mentioned above.

Bet Types

There are actually a variety of types of bets which could be placed on each race or a combination of races, tabulated as follows:

• Win
• Place
• Quinella
• Quinella Place
• Double Quinella
• Double Trio
• Triple Trio
• Six Up,
• Tierce and Double

The amounts of payouts of the bets depend on different rate of odds set by the Jockey Club beforehand. If any of Double Quinella, Double Trio, Six Up and Triple Trio pools has no bets placed on its winning combination there will neither be payout of dividend nor refunds. Its Net Pool will be carried forward to the "Jackpot" and aggregated into the coming event.

Ways of betting

• On-course Betting

There are over 210 betting terminals on-course. All terminals can perform sell and pay functions. Punters may bet in Hong Kong dollars or Macau patacas. Bets are accepted up to the start of each race. Punters may place a bet by oral instructions or by filling a ticket.

• Off-course Betting

There are over 80 betting terminals in the Off-Course Betting Centres. 14 Off-course Betting Centres are located in popular districts of Macau and Taipa. If necessary, the MJC would set up more Off-Course Betting Centres for racegoers.

• Internet Betting

The internet betting service commenced on 20 September 2003. Customers are welcome to browse through the Club's internet betting website at www.macauhorsebet.com.

• Telephone Services

There are over 600 telephone service terminals and a total of over 38,000 telebet accounts. The winning dividend of account holders may at their instructions be automatically transferred to their bank accounts. For enquiries and opening of telephone service accounts, patrons are welcome to call at 8631338 (Macau).

• Fast Access Terminals (FAT)

Launched in June 1997, the personal betting terminal, FAT (Fast Access Terminal) offers betting, calculation of bet units, record tracking of bets, account enquiry, withdrawal instructions and other related information on races such as declaration and race-odds. Close to 1,000 customers are currently using FAT.

• Hong Kong Service Centres

Three service centres are now set up in Hong Kong including Shaukeiwan Service Centre, Sheung Wan Service Centre and Mongkok Service Centre.

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4 Other forms of gambling: Greyhound Racing

Greyhound Racing takes place at the Canidrome on Avenida General Castelo Branco (see image above for the location of the canidrome). These races are held on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays and weekends starting from 7:45 p.m. and there are 16 games on every racing evenings. Admission is MOP$10 (usable for betting) for the public stand. Boxes are MOP$80 (Monday to Thursday) and MOP$120 (Friday to Sunday and Public Holidays) with a minimum charge of MOP$30 per person. Bar, snack-bars and restaurant facilities are available.

Generally, you can bet inside the greyhound racing centre. Also, you are allowed to bet in off-course betting centre which is located on the G/F of the Hotel Lisboa, Jai-Alai Palace and Kam Pek Casino. Thus, it is more convenient to you to enjoy gambling.

From the name of Greyhound, some people think that the word greyhound is derived from the old English word "grei," meaning dog, and "hundr," meaning hunter. However, other people may believe that the ancestor of "greyhound" is "gazehound", which means dogs which likes to hunt by sight rather than smell. Though the truth is still undefined, greyhounds have long been held in high esteem and they are originally bred as hunting companions or as racers. But anyway, these greyhounds are extremely fast runners as they can finish a lap of the Canidrome in 30 seconds.

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5 Gambling and society

Casino industry could be harmful to the society. High crime rate is one of the biggest problems that the Macau government has to face. With the growth of casino industry, business so-called “bate-ficha” is developed and it is usually run by different triad societies. “Bate-ficha” business simply means the rolling or exchanging of gambling chips between the customers (gamblers) and the “bate-ficha” guys (dapma-chai) or chip rollers. Triad involvements in Macau casinos impose a quite serious social impact to the local area. It has also attracted the attentions of Chinese triad gangsters whose deadly battles over the fortunes to be made from racketeering and extortion in the territory are a continuing problem. As different triad societies always try to compete for 'controlled territory' in the casinos, disputes between societies occur from time to time. And this is usually settled in illegal or violent ways. Even worse, triad societies have grown so powerful in Macau that there was a trend that people tried to seek help or to settle disputes from these societies rather than from the Police forces. Although the situation has got better since the handover, the problem is still enrooted in the local area.

Lowered productivity would be another problem that caused by gambling. Gambling would bring a misconception to citizens in society. It encourages people to pay the least effort in pursuing the greatest outcome. People try to rely on LUCK rather than paying effort on work. The addicted gamblers pay their full attention to gambling and some of them even give up their studies in school or works. As a result, less people in society will contribute to the production.

Other problems caused by the casino industry included increased bankruptcies, welfare problems, family problems, increased theft cases and loan shaking problems.

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6 Gaming policy

Detailed law is enforced in Macau to ensure qualified operation of gambling in Macau. The details are listed in the Regime jurídico da exploração de jogos de fortuna ou azar em casino.

Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau is set up in Macau to provide quality service and to promptly reply to the public and entity's application on the operation of lotteries sales, lucky draw or similar activities. It the one of the main government unit that overlooks the operation of different gaming activities.

Under the law of Macau, it stated that a permit issued by the Gaming Inspection and Coordination Bureau is required for the operation of lotteries sales, lucky draw or similar activities, and the initial procedure in the application on the operation of lotteries sales, lucky draw or similar activities is to submit a notification to the relevant government department 10 days prior to the application.

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7 External links

• Gambling in Macau (Simplified Chinese)
• Economy of Macau
• Directory of Macao casinos
• Macau legistration

Macau Macau

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