A showdown between traditional lottery companies in southern Vietnam and their computerized rival took place in Soc Trang Province, as the former gathered for their regular meeting on Tuesday.

Traditional companies, which issue pre-printed lottery tickets and offer top cash prizes of up to VND2 billion (US$89,286), have repeatedly denounced the computerized, American-style product offered by Vietlott since the latter’s entrance to the market in July 2016.

The computerized lottery ‘Mega 6/45’ allows people to choose a six-number combination from a pool of whole numbers between 1 and 45 at a cost of VND10,000, the same price as the conventional lottery.

Vietlott has attracted large numbers of players quickly and been accused of stealing the customers of traditional lottery companies. This is thanks largely to its record jackpot of at least VND12 billion ($536,000), which is rolled over into the next lottery period should no winner emerge.

At Tuesday’s meeting, leaders of the conventional lottery companies continued to attack their rival, saying the computerized lottery firm had “committed numerous violations.”

According to traditional companies, while Vietlott has officially launched Mega 6/45 in only 12 provinces, where authorized dealerships are technically the only source from which people can buy the tickets, Vietlott tickets are now available in many more provinces than that.

Unauthorized dealerships have been buying the official tickets and redistributing them to lottery ticket sellers in other provinces for VND11,000 or VND12,000 apiece, an act traditional lottery companies said is against the law.

In response, Nguyen Thanh Dam, Vietlott deputy general director, called on the traditional companies to “consider your words” because “you can only accuse us of breaching the law with an official conclusion from an authorized entity in hand.”

Dam said Vietlott is only a business, not a regulatory body, so “we cannot just go to any province and ask lottery ticket vendors there to follow the rule.”

He added that right from the beginning, Vietlott has taken several measures to reduce possible conflict between Mega 6/45 and the traditional lottery product.

“We set our commission rate at 8 percent compared to 15 percent of the traditional companies, and while we are allowed to earmark 60 percent of revenue to pay winners, we set that rate at 55 percent,” Dam elaborated.

Headache to regulatory agencies

Nguyen Hoang Duong, an official from the Ministry of Finance, said the conflict between conventional and computerized lottery is a headache for regulatory officials.

“The finance ministry has never favored computerized lottery over the conventional product,” he said.

Duong said that after five months, Vietlott had raked in more than VND1.6 trillion ($71.43 million) in revenue, contributing over VND400 million ($17.86 million) to state coffers, which he called “impressive figures.”

With traditional lottery companies required to channel most of their revenue to local budgets, Vietlott’s success has been said to have impacted the public revenue of the southern provinces.

“How the provincial budgets are affected exactly, and how to resolve the issue are leaving regulatory officials scratching over their heads,” Duong admitted.

The finance ministry official called on traditional lottery companies to “share the hardship and stay cooperative” while regulatory agencies work to find a reasonable solution to the issue.

Amid tough competition from their computerized rival, traditional lottery companies in southern Vietnam have now increased their top prize to VND2 billion from VND1.5 billion.

At yesterday’s meeting, Nguyen Ngoc Thuy, general director of the lottery company in Bac Lieu Province, said the prize should be increased to VND12 billion, the same as the minimum Mega 6/45 jackpot to ensure competitiveness.

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