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October 2: Harrah’s receives buyout offer
Harrah’s, the parent company of the World Series of Poker, confirmed it
received a buyout bid from an investor’s group. Harrah’s would not comment on
the specifics of the deal and would only say that it was reviewing the offer.
The offer is believed to exceed $15 Billion USD, which is a 22% premium over
Friday’s stock close. The timing of this deal is interesting, coming only two
days after a possible internet gambling ban on US residents.
October 2: Time Magazine checks out teenagers playing poker
The October 2 issue of Time magazine includes an interesting article
called “Parents for Poker” that takes a fair and impartial look at the
realities of teens and young adults who play poker. Nathan Thornburg’s article
first looks at a Torrance, California couple that encourages their teen son to
play poker against his friends for money. The parents’ logic is that poker
teaches him interpersonal, mathematic, logic, and observation skills. The
added benefit of knowing where their son is, whom he’s with, and how much
money he’ll risk is another plus for them.
The article then fairly looks at the darker side of poker, when the gambling
overtakes the card playing. A Lehigh University student was recently convicted
of theft after building up enormous debts playing online poker. Comments from
the National Council of Problem Gaming and Jeffrey Deverensky, the co-director
of the McGill University Youth Gambling Research Clinic were included.
October 3: High Stakes Poker announces taping
The third season of High Stakes Poker on the Game Show Network, will be taped
October 11th and 12th at the South Coast Casino in Las Vegas. Tapings will not
be open to the public, but the show should be ready to air late in 2006 or
early in 2007.
October 4: Bankers respond to new legislation
Laura Fisher, of the American Bankers Association, when asked about the
legislation recently passed by the US Congress, replied "this bill does not
add any burdensome responsibilities to banks. Fortunately, we were able to
work with the sponsors [of the bill] to minimize the downside."
"When I spoke to the credit card companies that we represent, they find the
new requirements to be workable, and in fact consistent to what they are
already doing. Some credit card companies already block payments to Internet
gambling sites. So, for them, it's something that is now mandated, but
something many of them have been doing already." Credit card transactions are
easily blocked when merchants use a proper merchant ID to identify their
business type.
The biggest area of lack of ability to enforce this legislation is checks (and
their electronic counterparts, ACH debits): "When you get to checks, and ACH
(automated clearing house) transactions, those are something that the industry
feels would be extremely difficult, if not impossible to monitor." Adds Fisher
"In terms of checks, there are 40 million checks processed per year.
Monitoring those transactions would be an impossible burden for the industry
to bear."
October 4: What poker sites will remain available to US players?
Although it is impossible to predict at this point what the fallout will be
from various poker sites due to the pending ratification of the UIGE Act, here
is an indication of which sites will and will not remain accessible to
American players now or in the future, based on official statements made by
the companies.
Sites likely to disallow US Customers:
- PartyGaming (Party Poker, Empire Poker)
- Pacific Poker (888.com)
- Cryptologic Network (Will Hill, Interpoker, et cetera)
- Boss Network (formerly B2B network)
- Sun Poker
- Bet Fred
- pkr.com
- Titan Poker (no indication about the other iPoker sites)
Sites expected to continue to allow US Customers:
- True Poker
- Paradise Poker (may be contradicted by a statement from owner SportingBet)
- Planet Poker
- Bugsy’s Club
- Full Contact Poker (although other Ongame sites have not committed)
- Absolute Poker
- Full Tilt Poker
- Poker.com
- UltimateBet
- WSEX (World Sports Exchange)
- Bodog
The following sites have stated only that they are reviewing the situation:
- Poker Stars
- Sportingbet (owners of Paradise Poker)
- PokerRoom
- Hollywood Poker
- Mansion
Continue to look to Blind Bet Poker for current news about your ability to
participate in games at the various sites. Generally it is believed that
privately-owned sites are unlikely to disallow US customers, since ownership
and management can be kept private, not subjecting US citizens to arrest.
Another factor is country of license and/or origin. This would suggest that
Paradise Poker, although based in Costa Rica and licensed by Kahnawake, would
pull out of the US market due to its ownership by Sportingbet, a UK plc.
UK companies and public companies are more likely to comply with US laws,
since they have a stake in potential future legalization, where “rogue”
operators like Full Tilt, Poker Stars, UltimateBet, and Absolute would be
unlikely to gain entry into the US market in a regulated environment. Although
these four sites are among the most respected and trusted by experienced poker
players, their non-traditional setup makes them more likely to have difficulty
entering the US market officially if regulation is ever established. That
being the case, such operators may be best served by taking advantage of other
sites’ US exodus and making money from these players while they can.
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