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League party funds can be permanently seized: Italian court

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Genova, Sep 6 (IANS/AKI) Some 49 million euros of funds can be confiscated from Italy’s far-right League Party after its former leaders including party founder Umberto Bossi were convicted last year in a vast fraud case, a court in Genoa ruled on Thursday.

The Genoa review commission ordered the permanent and final seizure of all bank accounts linked to the party because the funds were unaccounted for in part ledgers.

The League is not thought to have enough reserves to pay the 48.9 million euros of funds from its accounts and businesses belonging to the party and can appeal against each single asset seizure.

League lawyers insist the party currently has only 5.5 million euros, which come from donations, and that they might take the case back to Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation. Other funds may have been shifted abroad to avoid seizure, according to judicial sources.

There were 41,868 euros of League funds deposited in banks according to the party’s 2017 accounts which Adnkronos has seen. However, the ‘League for Salvini’ movement created by party leader Matteo Salvini had 30,431 euros of reserves.

Salvini, who is Italy’s Deputy Premier and Interior Minister, on Thursday appeared unfazed by the Genoa court ruling.

“I’m not upset at all because the case concerns things that happened eight or nine years ago. It’s an affair from the past,” he told reporters.

“If they want to take everything from us, they can go ahead. We’ll have no trouble staying in politics because the Italian people are with us.”

Salvini is said to be mulling a change to the party’s name to avoid the permanent seizure of its funds, according to sources close to the League.

High-ranking League member Giancarlo Giorgetti claimed last week that the confiscation of League funds would finish off the party, which currently governs Italy in coalition with the populist Five-Star Movement.

Bossi, his son Renzo and former treasurer Francesco Belsito were convicted in July 2017 of fraudulently obtaining the 49 million euros of state funds for the then Northern League.

A lower court found the trio guilty of embezzling hundreds of thousands of euros of the public funds in 2008-10 for their personal use.

The Bossis and Belsito were handed jail terms and fined and the League was ordered to repay close to 49 million euros of state financing that it had received.

–IANS/AKI
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Casino Days Reveal Internal Data on Most Popular Smartphones

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CasinoDays India

International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.

Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.

The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.

Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile

The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.

CasinoDays India

The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.

“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.

Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings

Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.

 

CasinoDays India

Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).

Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.

The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.

Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.

Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities

The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.

On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.

Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.

“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.

The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.

 

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