Inside Asian Gaming

February 2010 | INSIDE ASIAN GAMING 37 By that reading, the player only needs to get an extension on his line of credit, and eventually the tide of fortune will turn back in his favour. Fate vs. probability “Research on Chinese and non- Chinese decision making processes found a consistent and significant difference in probability judgment accuracy—one that concerns Chinese people’s overconfidence in judgment,” states Desmond Lam, Senior Research Fellow at the School of Marketing, University of South Australia in Adelaide. “In addition, past research has found that Chinese showed a lack of concern for uncertainty and exhibited less probabilistic thinking when making decisions,” adds Dr Lam, formerly an assistant professor at the University of Macau. There is also a body of research suggesting that across different cultures, success in business or personal life tends to encourage and extend risk-taking behaviour. “The [Chinese] upper social classes have more money to experiment with new purchases or make different choices. Wealth leads to greater risk appetite, which may develop into an increased appetite to gamble,” suggests Dr Lam. Belief in a lucky streak is not unique to Chinese gamblers, but it does seem to be reinforced strongly by cultural values found across Chinese communities. A joke told to investors by a senior gaming Credit Risk in September and is awaiting judgment. Referring to Mr Mong’s losing streak across two continents, Justice Rogers said: “This was what might colloquially be called a ‘double or quits’ operation. In fact, he doubled his losses”. Any extension of credit for any purpose involves risk that the borrower will not honour the debt. That’s where credit risk management comes in. But credit risk management as a business practice or even (by some less charitable readings) as a pseudo-science, does tend to assume that the parties to the deal have the same understanding of what the deal actually means. Chinese love triangle The reality of the triangular relationship between the Chinese gambler, the casino and the money the high roller seeks to borrow for his time at the table (whether from third party gambling agents or direct from the casino) may be more complicated. It’s possible there’s a fundamental mismatch between the intellectual and cultural traditions that led to the development of Western-style civil litigation rules on personal debt, such as those practised in the Anglo-Saxon countries (which after all is what the Hong Kong legal system is based on), and the intellectual and cultural traditions of China. This is not wishy- washy sociology attempting to introduce cultural relativism to an absolute moral issue such as honouring one’s debts. It’s about exploringwhat works andwhat doesn’t work on a practical level in the casino industry. Togainsomeinsightintothisfundamental issue, operators might like to consider the following scenario. Leaving aside those Mainland officials who have stolen money from state enterprises and used it to play in Macau, the majority of ethnic Chinese high rollers in Macau probably have a good track record with money and business by the time they earn a place at the VIP tables. Many must have a very good track record indeed. They have seen a business opportunity, pursued it tenaciously and become very wealthy—many of them within a decade or less. Why then would those same individuals be willing on occasion to risk their life’s work on a single night at the baccarat tables? Heaven sent The answer may seem obvious to many Chinese readers of this article, but less so to Western readers. It’s probably because those Chinese high rollers believe it’s their fate to be rich and their fate to be lucky. An academic study published in the Journal of Consumer Marketing, called ‘Ethical issues across cultures: Managing the differing perspectives of China and the USA’, gives a glimpse into that belief system. It suggests that for some Chinese people, ‘business knowledge’ is ranked in only fifth place when it comes to achieving success in business. The necessary attributes in descending order identified by those questioned for the study were: (1) fate; (2) luck; (3) feng shui; (4) accumulation of good deeds; and (5) knowledge. There are pitfalls with this belief systemwhen it rubs up against Western business practices as found in Las Vegas- controlled casinos. The chief one is that a person who believes it’s his fate to be lucky must necessarily view a losing streak as a temporary setback. Feng shui ranks above knowledge on the list of essential attributes for business success Belief in luck often trumps knowledge of statistics