Macau’s Court of First Instance will be auctioning off former junket boss Alvin Chau’s assets, which include 34 properties. To attract more buyers, the court has also reduced the total asking price of said assets to about MOP$300m (US$37.3m).
The auction, scheduled for 22 October 2024, will include one parking space at roughly MOP$1m, the other 30 spaces each priced at around MOP$1.1m and three commercial buildings valued at roughly MOP$50m, MOP$66.4m and MOP$159m respectively.
An earlier auction in February sold off 31 parking spaces and five commercial properties in Taipa belonging to Chau, obtaining a total of MOP$600m.
The sales of Chau’s assets will help settle the compensation of about HK$25bn (US$3.2bn) owed to the Macau Government for the crimes the former junket boss was found guilty of, which included criminal association, illegal gambling and money laundering.
Alvin Chau was arrested in 2021 and is currently serving an 18-year jail term. He appealed to Macau's Court of Final Appeal in early July but was rejected by the court.
Alvin Chau isn’t the only convicted ex-junket operator whose assets were being auctioned off by Macau’s courts.
Chan Yan Hung, an ex-junket manager who was accused of embezzlement from a VIP room at L’Arc Macau in 2016, also had his assets, worth HK$100m, auctioned off by the Court of First Instance.