Las Vegas - Global gambling revenue is estimated to pass USD 155 billion in 2012 after growing at an annually compounded rate of 6.5 percent per year, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP report released Wednesday. Gambling revenue is expected to rise from nearly USD 114 billion in 2007 because of new casinos and upgrades to existing ones around the world, the report said.

Online betting is banned in the City of Buenos Aires, because the Contraventional Code of the City punishes illegal gaming and its coverage, but the Mayor of the City, Mauricio Macri, analyzes to modify the law and call to a tender process to operate the business. In Argentina there is a legal void, because there isn’t a law on the matter and is just regulated by regional laws.

In South Korea, a growing number of people are gambling online with the help of illegal money dealers that change virtual winnings for real cash. Online gambling in the nation is illegal but increasing numbers of people are playing poker and blackjack while cases of addiction are on the rise. A report from MBC TV cited instances of online gamblers losing their entire savings because of their inability to stop gambling.

Washington and St John's have set a new deadline of Friday to resolve their dispute over Internet gambling, according to Antigua's top finance official. Antigua accuses the United States of crippling its gambling industry by banning Americans from placing online bets with gambling operators, including those based in the twin-island country of just 70,000 inhabitants.

The European Commission said France will provide detailed new legislation on the provision of its gambling services to its EU internal markets services by autumn. A spokesman for EU internal market commissioner Charlie McCreevy said: "France is working on this new legislation...(it) has promised the Commission to come forward with detailed legislation as early as autumn this year."

Revenue from Asian booming gambling resorts could surpass the United States by 2012, with growth driven by the southern Chinese gaming enclave of Macau and other sites, according to an industry survey recently released. Besides Macau, growth could also get a lift from casinos under construction in Singapore and sites being considered in other countries. Of the 23 industry executives, analysts and academics polled, more than 80 percent said Asia’s dominance was very likely or likely.

It is hard to believe the scale of Foxwoods Resort Casino. By floor space, it is the largest in the world. Its gaming rooms, hotels, theatres and shopping malls tower over thickly wooded forests in this once sleepy corner of New England. It is a shining city upon a hill, to which 40,000 people a day flock - from New York, Boston and beyond - to play on more than 7,000 slot machines and gamble at hundreds of tables.

Ledyard, Connecticut (Reuters) - Most of the past 400 years have been miserable for the Mashantucket Pequot. Almost annihilated by English settlers and the smallpox, the survivors were enslaved and scattered. Reduced to just a few dozen members by the 1970s, they grew lettuce and tapped maple syrup, living in poverty in trailers on a scrap of Connecticut woods. Gambling has changed all that.

As part of an ongoing major trade dispute over Internet gambling that has the United States in an increasingly difficult position to justify, the European Commission has now launched a formal investigation over US actions. The Commission submitted a list of questions to leading U.S. officials related to a possible U.S. trade violation for discriminatory trade practices against European online gambling companies according to Inside Trade.

A gambling concession in Chinese island Macau has been licensed to print money for billionaire Sheldon Adelson--helping make him one of America's richest men. But a Las Vegas jury's ruling this Saturday raises questions about how he got his hands on these lucrative rights. The jury found Adelson's Las Vegas Sands owes Hong Kong businessman Richard Suen USD 43.8 million for his role in the company's success.

Sweden’s state-owned gambling monopoly faces an unprecedented challenge this week that could open up the Nordic country’s lucrative betting industry to international competition. Swedish online gambling company Betsson will open a high street betting shop in Stockholm on Friday, deliberately breaching laws which state all bookmakers must be run by Svenska Spel, the state monopoly.

South Korean SK Telecom has announced that it will "aggressively" advance into the Chinese online gaming market, after buying a stake in Shanghai-based service provider Magicgrids Networks. South Korea’s leading mobile carrier said in a statement it has purchased a 30 percent stake in Magicgrids Networks for USD 7.8 million. SK Telecom said that online gaming is crucial in the new convergence industry along with music, citing that the revenue growth of the Chinese online gaming market has reached 82%...