Lottery fever sweeps through China

CHINA:A student in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing has abandoned his studies after his number came up in the country's biggest lottery for a five million yuan (€470,000) payout, the latest in a series of high-profile tales of lottery fever.

The second-year student at the Jiangsu Maritime Institute, who is being named only as Yong to protect his identity, won the "Double Colour Ball" prize in the China Welfare Lottery on Tuesday, according to the Beijing News. He informed the university authorities of his win, told his dormitory room-mates he would give them 2,000 yuan (€187) each and then went home.

"We are not sure if he will return to school, but we hope he will eventually finish his education," Yong's teacher said.

Lotteries were banned as evil capitalist distractions after the Communists swept to power in the 1949 Revolution but China's growing economic openness has led to a revival and they were reintroduced in 1987. They remain the only legal form of gambling in mainland China and are hugely popular.

The China Welfare Lottery was the country's first lottery when it began in June 1987 and it makes up nearly two-thirds of all lottery sales in China.

The appeal of lotteries in China cuts across all classes and they are similarly beloved of the new rich and the poor, prompting the government to set up a centre for lottery addicts in November, offering advice and legal help.

China's largest individual prize to date - €9.6 million - was won by an unidentified buyer in the dry, impoverished northwestern province of Gansu this month. The buyer bought 20 identical Double Colour Ball tickets in the China Welfare Lottery at a cost of 40 yuan, and chose the same seven sets of two-digit numbers on each, reaping a total of 102.7 million yuan.

This is quite a haul when you compare it to the average rural income of 2,000 yuan (€187) in many parts of Gansu.

The central government is planning to introduce laws to regulate the burgeoning industry next year and give regulators the power to combat a growing number of scams. In November, a 36- year-old lottery ticket seller in Liaoning province was jailed for life after exploiting a flaw in the system to win 28 million yuan (€2.6 million).

In April, two bank employees in Hebei province were sentenced to death for stealing 51 million yuan from the bank and using a large chunk of the money to buy lottery tickets.