“There was, before 2022, a wave of funds coming out of mainland China in breach of capital-control regulations and some of that was passing through unlawful gambling activities in Southeast Asia and Macau,” said Steve Vickers, CEO of Steve Vickers and Associates, a regional political and corporate risk consultancy.
In recent years, Southeast Asia’s casino industry has experienced exponential growth, with more than 340 licensed and unlicensed casinos in operation by early 2022, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said in a report in January. This followed a series of enforcement actions in Macau, the report explained, which were driven partly by efforts to tackle corruption, money laundering, and illegal capital outflows from mainland China.
Chau was arrested in November 2021 and sentenced to 18 years in prison in Macau in January last year. Chan was sentenced to 14 years, later reduced to 13 years, last April.