Is that worse than the legal loan sharking, the predatory expansion of gambling and any number of other ill-advised ventures people pursue voluntarily?

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The simultaneous contracts could be arranged to replicate any agreed interest rate while providing legal protection against default on one side and loan sharking on the other.

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Gold Club owner Kaplan and his associates are also accused of credit card fraud, money laundering, extortion, loan sharking, obstruction of justice, bribing two Atlanta police officers and having illegal mob ties, including paying protection money to the Gambino crime family.

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Lest it be accused of loan sharking, Sanwa Bank points out that the venture is aimed at untapped middle-income, middle-risk consumers (apparently it is already getting calls from school teachers and tax inspectors) who cannot borrow money at banks but flinch at traditional consumer-finance rates.

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With that promise in hand, the bank would make the purchase and immediately sell it onto the buyer at a mark-up, agreeing the buyer could pay, say, three months after goods are delivered--in effect, trade finance at a fixed rate with legal protection against default on the one side and loan sharking on the other.

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Still, there are juicy pickings to be had from loan-sharking to destitute gamblers.

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More than 30 people have been killed so far this year, as rival triads fight for control of lucrative gambling, loan-sharking and prostitution businesses.

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In Europe, for-profit medicine is barely more respectable than loan-sharking.

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