Poker In Asia: The Art Of War (Redux)

Asia will never cease to amaze by its unrivaled craze for gambling. Thanks to superstition as much as the strong social pressure in many eastern societies, gambling is the way to make your mind work and have some fun while hoping for a life changing gain.

As an industry, asian gambling has now offered the continent its new richest man Lui Che-woo, Macau’s biggest tycoon with his company Galaxy Entertainment doubling its revenue in 2013. The wave of fresh cash hitting China’s new millionaires its growing middle-class has allowed many to fly to Macau and Singapore’s resorts to heavily spend their money. Asians tourists can be met as well in many high-end casinos around Europe and in the US, Chinese now leading the pack of avid gamblers on the floors from Las Vegas to Monte-Carlo.

Macau is beating revenue records every quarters for the last two years.

In the poker community, many of them are too often seen as some fresh fishes and many pros are making the trip to Far East in hope of lucrative tournaments with mind blowing sums and cash games with lunatics local businessmen. But don’t get fooled, there is a long tradition of poker in asian countries and pro players originating from Viet-Nam or Hong-Kong have already proven that they travel well to beat the top Western players. Their young guns - such as Hong Kong’s native @Winfred Yu - are used to tensed nosebleeds cash games and handle gigantic stakes with ease.

The main limitation to a real growth of the player field depth is related to the poor state of online poker on the whole continent. A Japanese remake of Chris Moneymaker's rise to stardom could inspire millions of asian teenagers, and the wind could furiously blow to the East. Singapore is now the main hub for online gambling in the zone - under threat of a new restrictive legal framework - but coming regulations in the Philippines, Viet-Nam or Malaysia on that matter are far from being defined. China’s internet being what it is, the biggest hope is to see Japan loosen a bit it’s regulations and at least allow its citizens to access foreign operators. So #Macau is clearly the place of choice with its coming regulations that will define the shape of asian online gambling for the years to come.

Still, the main threat to Asia booming game industry is not a shortage in Greyhound dogs but the global economy. The current surge of money and the colossal investments forecasted for new resorts from South Korea to Viet-Nam will quickly dry up if things slow down, and there is only a finite field of players and liquidity available. Hence, online gaming - and more specifically virtual card rooms - are the fittest to survive a potential meltdown of the economy while providing much welcomed tax revenues may things go wrong.

Deep stacked, the asian way. 

Not that online gambling and poker are far from being unknown on the continent but depositing and cashing out remains a tough task, even after you’ve managed to find a decent offshore operator. Counting countries among the most connected in the world (Japan, South Korea), with financial and game hubs such as Hong-Kong, Macau and Singapore plus (once again) growing economies of the size of the Philippines and the South East asian zone, the potential is mind boggling. But many investors may well loose more than there buyin.

Some reading: 40 Poker Tips From Sun Tzu’s Art of War