Anti-corruption campaign bagged 50 offenders
China’s sports regulatory body is considering lottery-style wagering on games played by domestic soccer leagues, according to GGRAsia and Caixin, a mainland media outlet.
The reports say the General Administration of Sport has laid out a sports lottery plan even though existing sports lottery sales dropped 5.7 percent year-on-year for 2015, to RMB166.4 billion (US$25.5 billion), according to data from the Ministry of Finance.
Though Chinese domestic soccer has long been plagued by allegations of match fixing, the situation may have been remedied by the Mainland Chinese government’s two-fisted assault on graft, corruption and money laundering in the gaming industry. According to Bloomberg News, the campaign by Chinese President Xi Jinping—himself a soccer fan—has led to some 50 arrests and charges against two high-ranking sports officials, several World Cup players, and a World Cup referee known as “the golden whistle.”
According to China’s recently released five-year plan, the country’s sports industry is likely to generate turnover amounting to more than RMB 3 trillion (US$460 billion) by the end of 2020.
“China’s overall sports industry turnout will be amounting to more than RMB3 trillion, accounting for one percent in GDP with the added value of sports service taking up 30 percent in the overall sports industry,” said the five-year plan issued by China’s General Administration of Sport.
