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The legality of online poker is still a grey area in India, and while the game’s popularity continues to surge on the subcontinent, the Indian government has some fairly strict restrictions when it comes to granting official licenses for online poker rooms meaning only a few gambling operators have so far managed to obtain one. At present, the specific Indian law that relates to online gambling and poker is the Information Technology Act of 2000, as well as other laws such as the Indian Penal Code, Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Public Gambling Act. As a result, an unlicenced poker room may find its access blocked by Internet service providers, even though there is an exemption in Indian law for games of skill. This is because the country’s government has still to decide whether or not online poker games fall into that category and so the atmosphere of uncertainty continues to exist in India.

As the befuddled situation is explained on CJNEWS: “The crux of the legal position seems to be that if an online poker website is following the laws of India while operating in India, it is legal to play online poker in India. However, if the laws of India are breached during such online presence both the cyber law of India and other applicable state laws may be attracted.”

Nevertheless, the regulatory environment for online gambling in India is fast changing, with card games like poker and rummy attracting increasing support from both players and the judicial fraternity, alike. Meanwhile, even though fines are sometimes assigned to online poker sites, individual player are in no danger of prosecution under current India law.

One thing worth being aware of, however, is that in India a poker player is required to declare and pay a 30% tax on his live or online winnings and so players are advised to check with their local tax authorities for specifics on how to file and pay the correct amount of taxes.


The State Of Online Poker In India

Viktor Blom aka Isildur1, the Swedish poker pro continues his superb run in 2014, adding another $300,000 to his tally.

Isildur1, whom we now know as Viktor Blom, a highly-talented poker professional from Sweden, continues his great start of 2014. Blom has had a very good beginning of the year earnings wise, but now the Swede is really collecting the dollars.

One of the biggest stories in casino gambling news today was Blom’s addition of $300,000 to his bankroll. Isildur1 battled SallyWoo at $2K/$4K Omaha Hi/Lo tables yesterday. The matchup was controlled by Blom from the very beginning, and despite SallyWoo’s decent comeback later on, the Swede took home the big bucks after only one and a half hours of action.

The two professional players’ match has also produced yesterday’s biggest pots. Take a look at a couple of them: Isildur1 flopped the nuts, with SallyWoo presumably making a decent full house (10s over 6s): $60,000K pot. And another one: SallyWoo aggressively plays hi and lo draw combo catching the nuts on the river resulting in a $56,000 payout.
How’s Viktor Blom doing this year?

The latest $300,000 score will go nicely with Blom’s previous earnings, making up over $1.6 million in profits this year. This makes the Swedish poker genius the biggest winner of 2014 so far. Blom had another great run against Alex “IReadYrSoul” Millar, scooping $630K at $300/$600 NLHE tables. That win allows Isildur1 to end the day at $563K, but he almost lost it all the very next day. Unfortunately, we don’t know if Blom is playing online or using Android casino poker app to access the site.

Viktor Blom’s $1.6 million profit so far does put him in the lead, but Ben “Bttech86” is breathing heavily down the Swedish poker pro’s neck with a total of $1.45 million profits so far this year. The pair are the only players to break the seven digit mark when it comes to online poker profits this year.



Isildur1 is Back as Online Poker Saurons Tremble With Fear | | Blackjack ChampBlackjack Champ

Reports coming out of Delaware show that it is slow going for the state’s new online poker regime. Officials have said that during Delaware’s first two months of regulated online poker laws, the state managed to generate only $253,000.

These initial numbers mean that Delaware is still way off course to meet the target $5 million that analysts predicted the industry would generate in its first year of online gambling operations. It also means that Delaware’s land casinos won’t be able to enjoy any of the revenues, as state laws dictate that the state will collect all proceeds of the first $3.5 million generated.

Statistics show that Delaware online poker rooms have an average of 18 players at any given time at its sites. This is in sharp contrast to the other two regulated states, New Jersey and Nevada, who boast several hundred players at a time.

Compared to the 125,000 new accounts opened at online casino sites in New Jersey, Delaware has reported on only 4,000 registered online gambling players.

Officials in the First State remain optimistic, however, that the new industry is just experiencing teething problems and numbers will grow in the coming months. Besides geo-location issues that still need to be ironed out, several US financial institutions have continued their policy of turning down transactions to and from online gambling sites – despite them being legal under individual state law – and therefore leaving many players with very few options to pay for their online poker entertainment.

“ In and of itself, it’s not going to be the thing that solves everybody’s financial issues,” noted the director of the Delaware Lottery, Vernon Kirk said. “It’s a piece of the puzzle, and it’s got a lot of potential.”



Delaware Online Poker Struggling to Attract Players

India is a place of gamers and gamblers. There is no doubt about this position. However, India is also a place where the laws and regulations regarding online gaming and gambling are not in proper shape. This has created a situation of legal uncertainty among the gaming enthusiastics and gaming entrepreneurs of India as online gaming industry is still maturing in India.

It has been reported that the Mumbai crime branch has busted an online gambling websites in India that was operating in an illegal manner. This is just a single online gaming website that has been busted as there are many more websites to be legally scrutinised by Indian law enforcement agencies.

While we have no dedicated online gambling laws in India yet online gambling is regulated to a great extent by provisions of Information Technology Act, 2000. A good website spreading awareness about online gaming and gambling laws in India can be found here.

The present trends regarding regulatory frameworks vis-à-vis online gambling and online gaming are not very encouraging. For instance, the United States (US) is still struggling to decide about the legality of online poker. In fact, Merge Gaming recently suspended online poker accounts in New Jersey and Delaware citing security reasons. Similarly, Singapore is planning to ban online gamming websites. The attempt of United Kingdom’s government to force UK ISPs to show warning pages for unlicensed gambling websites has also been foiled by the ISPs.

India is also not very far away from these legal restrictions. According to Praveen Dalal, partner at New Delhi based IT law firm Perry4Law, operating an online poker website in India may be either legal or illegal depending upon the legal compliances that such website is complying or not complying. Even the most famous poker websites in India are not complying with Indian laws to run legally sustainable poker websites in India informs Dalal.

It seems online poker websites in India are heading toward legal troubles as sooner or later the law enforcement agencies may come knocking at their doors due to their non compliance with Indian laws.


Online Poker Websites In India Are Heading Towards Legal Troubles | Business, Enterpeneurs | GroundReport-com – Latest World News & Opinions

Jason Mercier exploded onto the live tournament scene in 2008, winning the European Poker Tour San Remo main event for nearly $1.4 million after winning his entry in an online satellite. Still in his twenties, Mercier has already managed to become one of the most successful tournament players in the history of poker, winning 18 career titles and accruing more than $9.8 million in live tournament earnings, along with another $750,000 in online tournament winnings.

Mercier recently announced himself as a Christian after a few years of quietly grappling with his beliefs. Religion is not a topic often discussed in the poker world, but Mercier felt compelled to be open about his faith in a blog on his personal website, which discussed his beliefs and a recent commitment to finding balance in his life away from the poker table. Card Player caught up with Mercier during the 2014 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure to talk to him about his recent revelation, his goals for the year and more.

Erik Fast: So Jason, your grandparents just got in…

Jason Mercier: Both set’s of grandparents. All four!

EF: Both sets, and your parents as well. Is this the first time that your family has been able to come out and see you play poker professionally?

JM: I think it’s like the fourth time my parents have come out to watch me play.

EF: You’ve been mentioning on social media that you’ve spent some more time recently around your family and friends from your youth, and how that’s been a really good thing for you. So it must be cool to be able to include them in your work, as opposed to having the poker world and the family world being so separate.

JM: It’s nice for them to be here. A couple of my buddies have been here as well, and it’s nice because a lot of times I leave Florida and it’s like, “Okay, seeya in a month!” or whatever. It’s hard to maintain contact, so it’s kinda nice to have a piece of home with me.

EF: In the blogs you recently posted, you said, and I’m paraphrasing, that ‘in way, you feel as if you haven’t shown the poker world who you really are’. When you have two separate lives, split between poker and family, do you feel that you sort of end up acting like a different person in the poker world than you do at home? And if so, how do you think making a concerted effort to balance the two worlds better will help?

JM: It’s interesting, in regards to that, sometimes I wasn’t sure if I was subconsciously acting for the cameras that come around at events, and you don’t even realize why you are doing certain things. So I’ve learned to be open and honest and just act like the cameras aren’t even there. That’s something that Daniel [Negreanu] taught me, and it is definitely something that I’ve been working on. I’m just trying to be a good person and have everybody fall in love with me, if they haven’t already! (laughs.)

EF: Was there any particular misconception about you that you might be hoping to dispel with your recent focus on being true to yourself?

JM: I want people to know that I have a sense of humor and am not too serious of a guy. I’ve gotten people on Twitter and other forms of media who have come to the conclusion that I’m an arrogant prick. I think that the people in the poker media and my friends who know me would disagree with that characterization. That’s something that I’ve realized that I can’t control, so I’m just going to try to be as good of a person as I can be.

EF: Another thing that you recently brought up in your blogs is your faith, and your decision to discuss it publicly, something that you’ve been hesitant to do previously. Can you talk a little bit about why you might have thought that your faith might have been less than well received in the poker world?

JM: It’s just one of those subjects that, at the poker table, no one ever really talks about Church or that they do believe in God. It just seems like in the poker world, most people just think that if you believe in God that you’re ignorant or stupid. But, coming out with beliefs in the blog I’ve gotten almost nothing but positive responses. People just want to learn more about what I believe and why I believe it. It’s been cool to see the responses and see a lot of poker players say that they’ve gone through similar experiences and believe in God themselves.

EF: Where you really worried that a lot players in the poker world that you were friendly with would actively be against or react negatively to your beliefs, or did you just not want to put your faith out so much that people had to react to it?

JM: One of the things that I guess prevented me from talking about it was mostly my own insecurity about it and not having a good enough grasp of what I even truly believed in. My friends in the poker world that knew that I was a Christian would poke jokes about it sometime, and I wasn’t confident enough in my beliefs to do anything besides brushing it off, saying it was my parents’ thing. Better defining my own faith has helped me in the process of feeling more comfortable in talking about it.

EF: So you’ve been actively talking about finding balance in your life as a poker player recently. This kind of seems to fit in with a recent trend among many poker pros to focus on their fitness and physical health. It used to be that back in the day, many poker pros seemed to fit better into the old school gambler profile, while many of today’s pros are approaching their poker and their time away from the tables more analytically. What’re your thoughts on that?

JM: When I posted the blog about balance, one of the things that I was really struggling with was not getting enough sleep. That’s something that I’ve had problems with over the past five or six years. I would go months with only four hours of sleep a night and then crash, talking a couple weeks off and sleeping 12 hours a night. Realizing that trying to get the same amount of sleep every night, at least seven hours, has definite

Poker players found guilty of cheating at online tables might soon risk being sentenced with up to 10 years of imprisonment according amendments being discussed at the House of Lords.

As reported by The Telegraph, the amendments have been presented by former sports minister Lord Moynihan, twice Chairman of the British Olympic Association and British coxswain Olympic silver medalist at Moscow games in 1980.

Based on the laws passed one year ago by the Australian state of Victoria, which seem to have given a significant contribution in fighting against corruption in sports, the amendments are intended to give both police and courts more powers against cheating and increase the maximum sentence from 2 to 10 years.

Presented mainly for tackling the issue of match-fixing by making it a criminal offense, the modifications to the UK Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Bill 2013-14 – now in its final stages – would in case of approval have direct consequences also in regards to cheating and collusion in poker.

The measures proposed by Lord Moynihan are the result of a consultation with Britain's Sports Betting Group, a body formed in 2010 after the creation of a report of gambling in sport led by former Premier League CEO Rick Perry and commissioned by the British government.


Online Poker Cheats Could Get Prison Sentence in the United Kingdom | PokerNews

The French online gambling jurisdiction is controlled by the regulating body called ARJEL which has launched its second awareness campaign to inform the public about illegal gaming operators. Only three years since regulated online poker was sanctioned by the government the organization is looking at measures to increase the demand for legal online poker action. The serious decline in the activity and thus the revenues derived from internet poker are being addressed by educating the players about the risks involved while playing at unlicensed web domains.

The new and unconventional advertisements by ARJEL feature men walking around completely nude after they have lost everything including their clothes after playing illegal games.The campaign that is being pushed on radio television and the net says, "You have only to lose when you play on non-ARJEL regulated websites"

The regulators says it’s all about the consumer and protecting their rights. It is suggested by ARJEL that theft of personal and bank data and problems when trying to cash winnings are among the main issues players may experience if they punt on unlicensed operator web locations. "It is crucial to make players aware of the risks they take when playing on non-regulated operators," the regulator says.

While other jurisdictions are taking different angles to combat the decline in poker activity on regulated sites France has decided to go with education instead of allowing compacts with other European jurisdictions to add to the liquidity of the poker rooms available. The latest poll is indicating that poker activity is declining in not only France but also Italy and Spain.

Former head of ARJEL Jean François Vilotte and member of the Economic Affairs Committee at the French parliament Damien Abad have been focusing efforts on how France should consider being more open to modify its online gambling legislation.


Online Poker Decline In France Prompts Action | Online-Casinos-com

An elderly man reportedly became so addicted to online poker that he defrauded a fast food restaurant owner out of €135,000, Independent.ie reported.

Seventy-four-year-old John Carlos, a former school teacher and part-time accountant, admitted in Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to stealing the money from his former employer, Eddie Rockets franchise owner Peter Fortune.

The crimes took place between 2005 and 2008.

Carlos reportedly was losing vast sums on Paddy Power’s poker site. He fell into debt and couldn’t repay. He is out on bond and will be sentenced in June.

Every now and then there are headlines such as these. Last fall, for example, a Massachusetts pastor was accused of stealing $230,000 to fund his gambling habit. A nun in the state of New York not long ago received 90 days in jail for stealing $130,000 to fund her betting. Also, a prominent rabbi in the Chicago area was busted for trespassing and identity deception for casino gambling even after self-excluding himself, but those charges were dropped.

And then there are stories of the super rich blowing hundreds of millions of dollars.

In November, a new study shed some light on the decision making of gambling addicts.


Elderly Man Stole

A 74-year-old highly-respected former school teacher and part-time accountant entered a guilty plea in Dublin Circuit Criminal Court, admitting to pilfering money via his position as an accountant at Eddie Rockets in order to fund his online poker play.

While employed by the fast food chain, John Carlos altered cheque amounts and forged signatures from 2005 and 2008 to the tune of €135,000, depositing the ill-gotten gains at Paddy Power Poker. His addiction to poker on the virtual felt apparently developed in his sixties following a successful career teaching school children, the Irish Independent reported.

A resident of Galway, Carlos' misdeeds caught up with him in 2008 when his employer, Eddie Rockets franchise owner Peter Fortune, received a letter from government offices requesting a tax audit. An independent accounting firm hired by Fortune to unearth bookkeeping discrepancies discovered the suspicious cheque activity perpetrated by Carlos.

Carlos' guilty plea comes on the heels of an armed robbery charge levied against a senior citizen in the U.S. about three weeks ago for attempting to hold up a bank in order to make up for losses suffered while playing poker and betting on horses. John A. Dougherty, 73, faces nine counts related to a failed bank robbery in Florida in January.


Senior Citizen Turns to Fraud to Satisfy Penchant for Online Poker | PokerUpdate

New Jersey gaming regulators have given Wynn Resorts Ltd. approval to offer an Internet wagering website within the state’s boundaries, but a spokesman for the Las Vegas-based casino operator said the company’s online gambling efforts are on hold.

Wynn Resorts spokesman Michael Weaver said Monday that the company, which is headed by Steve Wynn, doesn’t view online gaming “to be a good entrepreneurial opportunity. Consequently, our plans are on hold until we understand the business opportunity.”

In actions taken in late January but made public Monday, New Jersey’s Gaming Enforcement Division granted authority to Wynn Interactive to conduct Internet gambling with partner Caesars Interactive, a subsidiary of Caesars Entertainment Corp.

The division also granted a request by Wynn and Caesars Interactive to conduct Internet gambling operations with the All American Poker Network and 888 Atlantic Limited, an affiliate of a Gibraltar-based online betting firm 888 Holdings.

However, in an interview with political commentator Jon Ralston, which appeared on Ralston’s website Sunday, Wynn said he now doesn’t see a “business opportunity” in online gaming. Wynn also said he questioned the technology used to track players and block minors from gambling online.

Wynn told Ralston the technology “was impressive if you were a cyberguy. But it was bullshit.”

Wynn stopped short of calling for an all-out prohibition of legalized online gaming, which has been proposed by Las Vegas Sands Chairman Sheldon Adelson. Sources said Wynn does not plan to financially back the effort by Adelson to halt online gaming legalization in Washington, D.C., or state by state.

New Jersey approved Wynn for a so-called transactional waiver that enables the company to offer Internet gambling with Caesars Interactive, which has two of New Jersey’s Internet gambling permits.

“We are allowing them to use one of our permits,” Caesars Interactive spokesman Seth Palansky said.

Wynn applied for the license in 2013.

Caesars Interactive operates six gambling websites, including the 888 and WSOP sites.

Weaver said the financial results from legal online gaming in New Jersey and Nevada were unimpressive. New Jersey’s online gaming activities garnered $8.4 million in its first six weeks.

Nevada, which has just two poker-only Internet gaming sites, won’t break out the figures until a third website is licensed.

Union Gaming Group estimated online poker was responsible for about $200,000 in gaming revenue during December.

“We’ll put everything on hold and monitor it for now,” Weaver said.

There are 15 Internet gambling sites in New Jersey. Casinos licensed to operate the sites are the Borgata; Caesars Atlantic City; Bally’s Atlantic City; Golden Nugget Atlantic City; Tropicana; Trump Plaza; and the Trump Taj Mahal, which has a partnership with Station Casinos-owned Ultimate Gaming.

Resorts Casino Hotel has an Internet permit but is not offering online gambling.

Separately, a poll conducted by Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind found more New Jersey residents want to smoke pot than gamble online.

The survey found 41 percent of respondents would support smoking marijuana recreationally if it became legal. That compares with 32 percent who support gambling over the Internet.

The poll finds support for online gambling has fallen, even as it enters its third full month and more than 150,000 online gambling accounts have been set up in the state.



Howard Stutz: Wynn Gets OK for Online Gambling in New Jersey but Puts Efforts on Hold

The Italian Senate has passed an amendment to a government finance bill that will ban radio and television gambling advertising. The amendment means that the bill now returns to the Italian House of Representatives for a third reading.

The ban was proposed by Socialist Party Senator Riccardo Nencini, who triumphantly announced: “The government expressed itself in opposition during the debate, then… changed its mind and shared our arguments.” He continued: “It’s a success for the whole socialist delegation, a battle began in the House by Marco Di Lello and continued and won in the Senate. A direct shot at interest groups.”

In line with other European socialist parties, the Italian party opposes gambling advertising on the grounds that it “induces compulsive behaviors” and contravenes EU rules on the protection of minors. The Spanish Socialist Party has recently proposed several anti-gambling measures in Spain.

Online poker in Italy has been in decline almost since regulation was introduced. Should the proposed ban be implemented, it may further deter the possibility of growth.



Italian Senate Votes to Ban Poker Advertisements | Pokerfuse Online Poker News

Another solid week for Viktor “Isildur1” Blom resulted in him padding his profits on the year to $1.8 million, according to data from HighstakesDB.

Blom’s latest profits came at the pot-limit Omaha and the limit deuce-to-seven triple draw tables. He was playing the likes of Ben “Bttech86” Tollerene and Niklas “ragen70” Heinecker.

The Swedish Blom is known for being the catalyst for the high-stakes games.

Tollerene is the second biggest winner this year with $1.4 million in earnings. Heinecker was last year’s top earner, but opted out of having his results tracked this year. Tollerene and Blom have actually been alternating back and forth for the 2014 lead.

Other big winners this year include some of the game’s best.

Viktor “Isildur1” Blom — $1,788,430
Ben “Bttech86” Tollerene — $1,407,660
mikki696 — $594,290
Doug “WCGRider” Polk — $577,897
Isaac “luvtheWNBA” Haxton — $393,494
Dan “jungleman12” Cates — $274,891
Bryn “BrynKenney” Kenney — $234,425

The list of losers on the year has remained pretty consistent, with Full Tilt Poker pro Gus Hansen leading the way like usual. He is down more than $16 million lifetime on the software.

Gus Hansen — $1,375,906
Alex “IReadYrSoul” Millar — $660,221
SanIker — $305,705
Patrik “FinddaGrind” Antonius — $303,590
Ben “Sauce1234” Sulsky — $195,283
Martin Kabrhel — $149,372
pummelfee123 — $134,198

Sulsky was the biggest winner in 2012, but dropped a ton last year. He has started of 2014 on the wrong foot as well. Can he turn things around or have people figured him out?



Online Poker: Blom Up $1.8 Million In 2013 - Poker News

Independet business data provider, Gambling Compliance revealed last week that ten US states are eyeing the introduction of internet gambling this year. According to the group, proposals for new or expanded online poker could be considered in California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. These states will join the existing states where online gambling has become a reality, namely Nevada, Delaware and New Jersey.

The research director for Gambling Compliance, Chris Krafcik said: “In 2013, 10 states considered legislation that would legalize online casino-style gambling, which was a historic high. This year is shaping up to be at least as busy.”

Californian groups hope to iron out an agreement that is acceptable to all groups, including Indian tribes, before August 31st and leaders from two coalitions reported on progress following a meeting last month.

News from Mississippi, however, is less optimistic, as a bill that would have seen some advancement on the internet poker front got defeated last week.

Some of the predictions made by Gambling Compliance include the fact that Nevada may seek to expand beyond its current online-poker-only regime and test drive other online gambling options.

We should also see progress in Delaware and New Jersey, according to the group, with Delaware to seek out interstate compacts in order to make its market more viable and New Jersey allowing Atlantic City casinos to accept foreign bets and wagers from interstate jurisdictions.

On the federal front, Gambling Compliance believes that we won’t be seeing any progress, with any proposed bills likely to go the same way that similar bills went last year. Lawmakers are not likely to dabble in any type of bills that may be deemed “controversial” in a midterm election year, and therefore federal US online poker will probably be off limits in 2014.


Ten States to Pursue Online Poker This Year

Joe Hachem’s latest remarks in which he expressed regret that the game of "poker is dying" fired up the whole poker community. From the 2+2 forums to the high stakes professionals playing in the 2014 Aussie Millions tournaments, everybody seems to have taken sides on the never-ending battle of the generations.

Daniel Negreanu, for example, agrees in many ways with what Hachem said four days ago. He called the younger generation “short-sided” because they think in terms of equity and expected value even when they are away from the poker table.

“In the long term, creating more interest in the game and keeping people interested keeps the numbers up, keeps more new people coming into the game, whereas if everyone approaches it at a cut-throat kind of business level like bum-hunting online, then eventually the money will dry up,” Negreanu said in a BLUFF interview.

The Canadian explained that somebody from the new online generation must step up, interact with the fans and encourage people to play poker.

On the other hand, 2007 WSOP Main Event winner Jerry Yang doesn’t believe poker is dying. He told PokerNews-com that the passion for poker will never die out. He acknowledges the regression of the game but thinks that the world economic situation is in fact the real problem why there are less and less people playing poker.

Yang was accused by Hachem of destroying the legacy of poker and of not being a good ambassador for the game.

Meanwhile, on 2+2 forums, the opinions are divided. Players like Dani “Asnky” Stern agree with the Aussie, while other posters and experienced poker coaches blame legislation and high rake. Many see Black Friday and other poker scandals like UltimateBet as the tipping point that marked the regression of the game.

The rake is also a problem for both live and online play. “Rake is the biggest thing killing poker,” user “iPUTnutsONtheTABLE” posted, giving examples of cash rakes up to 10% and caps of $5 or $6 and 25% tournament rakes.

“LolZombies” stated in a post about the current state of online poker compared with what was happening four or five years ago when the prize pools were huge and the European networks were filled with recreational players. Now all those poker rooms have cut their guaranteed prizes to a quarter and are left with only bum-hunters. “I can’t see online poker lasting another decade the way it’s heading. Something drastic needs to be done to get a mass influx of new players,” he wrote.

Nevertheless, there are still many players who believe that poker is in fact still alive and well. “Poker is not dying, just changing, or maybe reverting to what it was pre TV Boom. The sky is not falling folks,” poster “Bene Gersserit” assured us.

Where do you stand?



Poker Community Reacts to Joe Hachem's "poker is dying" Comment | PokerUpdate

A South Carolina Indian tribe’s effort to open a gambling casino in neighboring North Carolina is being spearheaded by a businessman with long ties to video poker, an industry lawmakers have long sought to outlaw.

A company called Sky Boat LLC is working with the Catawba Indian Nation to build a casino that promises to bring 4,000 jobs to a site off Interstate 85 near Kings Mountain, The Charlotte Observer and the News & Observer of Raleigh reported. The company selected by Catawba leaders to operate a casino is led by 40-year-old Wallace Cheves, of Greenville, S.C., whose business activities have included video poker, riverboat gambling and other gambling ventures.

North Carolina already has one Indian casino, owned by the Eastern Band of Cherokee and operated by a major gambling company, Harrah’s.

The Catawbas want to build the second after South Carolina laws blocked the tribe’s effort to build a casino in its home state. The tribe continues to challenge the laws, including a case before South Carolina’s Supreme Court last month.

The North Carolina effort about 30 miles northwest of the Catawbas reservation in Rock Hill, S.C., is on hold while the tribe seeks a decision by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs whether to place the property in trust.

The move is opposed by Gov. Pat McCrory, who doesn’t want a compact with the tribe that would include the state receiving a share of the gambling revenue. More than 100 state House lawmakers have signed a letter opposing the casino.

Sky Boat last year hired Raleigh lobbyists to try and diminish the political opposition. They included the former executive director of the state Republican Party, his wife, and the former chief of staff to U.S. Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C. Cheves said he will hire them again this year.

“Our background is not just video poker,” Cheves said. “It’s gaming. We have a lot of political background and have done a lot of consulting with other tribes. That’s why (the Catawbas) chose our consortium of entrepreneurs, just as Harrah’s was chosen by (the Eastern Band of Cherokee) because of their gaming background.”

Cheves said he has secured financing for the casino with help from partners including former Merrill Lynch bankers.

Catawba Chief Bill Harris said the tribe has been surprised by the backlash from Raleigh, where lawmakers have said they don’t want an out-of-state tribe running a casino. The Catawbas counter that their tribal service area extends into six North Carolina counties.

“Their quick opposition, I think, is what shocked the people in this community,” Harris said. “Someone is coming in and going to place 4,000 jobs in the area.”

But the casino’s ties to video poker and its successor, the sweepstakes industry, are raising more objections among state policymakers who have tried for more than a decade to outlaw them.

“Video poker has been a source of corruption and a challenge for law enforcement in North Carolina, and it’s troubling that this industry keeps looking for ways to expand its presence here,” said Attorney General Roy Cooper, a Democrat.



Casino developer has long video poker ties | Salisbury Post

A man from Kazakhstan has won almost $500,000 in two poker tournaments held at the PokerStar website in one week, Tengrinews reports.

First, he made it into the finals of the Red Spade Open participated by more than 32 thousand people. He finished second missing title, but walked away with the lions share of the prize pool: $225,689. And then 7 days later he won the first place in the Sunday Million tournament - 7,485 competitors - and got $224,550 pushing his eight-day total to a staggering $450,239.

The player fro Kazakhstan who goes under the nick Agrobot_388Z was steadily grinding small tournaments before he suddenly landed the two huge wins in November. His prize money was almost the same in the two tournaments, this adds some mystery to the story.

There is no more information about the poker player from Kazakhstan, except his nickname Agrobot_388Z. According to some assumptions, the lucky man may be living in Petropavlovsk, in northern Kazakhstan.

According to the gambling statistics, the Kazakhstani started playing in 2013 and participated in more than one thousand tournaments, but didn't strike much luck until the first decade of November.

For more information see: A Kazakh wins half a million dollars in one week playing poker. Strange News. Tengrinews.kz
Use of the Tengrinews English materials must be accompanied by a hyperlink to en.Tengrinews.kz

Internet gambling will destroy lives and homes while helping mobsters and terrorists, at least according to a new ad funded by Sheldon Adelson.

The billionaire casino magnate's anti-online-gambling group is out with its first video attempting to take down Internet gambling by likening it to a home-destroying activity that will aid money-laundering criminals and terrorists.

"While the FBI is busy defending against terrorist threats and cyberattacks, Internet gambling will give criminals across the world a foothold in every American household, attracting criminal activity not only at home but internationally," the ad warns, while attempting to pass off press releases and editorials that claim the activity is a "strategic national threat" as objective news reporting.


Senate Commerce Chairman Jay Rockefeller said last year that Internet gambling may pose some risks, including "potential for money laundering used for terrorist financing." But despite such concerns in some corners, online gambling advocates quickly pounded on the video, calling it "absurd" and "irresponsible."

"The notion that licensed and regulated Internet poker would be an attractive conduit for terrorism financing is on its face laughable," said John Pappas, executive director of the Poker Players Alliance, in a statement. "There isn't a shred of evidence to support this, except for far-fetched claims manufactured by this coalition."

The rhetoric of the attack ad—and its ominous backtrack and alarmist narrator—is nothing new from Adelson, who vowed last year to "spend whatever it takes" to stop online gambling in the U.S., which he has persistently lambasted as "a societal train wreck waiting to happen."

The best part? Expect more videos of this ilk to flood the Web in the weeks ahead. Today's clip, which arrives as at least 10 states are weighing legislation that would legalize or loosen restrictions on Internet gambling, is the beginning of a six-figure "awareness campaign" from Adelson's group. The ad additionally cites an FBI letter suggesting that online casinos "are vulnerable to a wide array of criminal schemes."

But the octogenarian business mogul has made it clear that no sum of money is too large for him to throw around in pursuit of any political goal. Adelson, of course, rose to national prominence during the 2012 presidential election cycle, when he spent tens of millions of dollars supporting a litany of Republican contenders. His cash infusions to Newt Gingrich's flagging campaign virtually kept the former House Speaker in the race long after it was clear he wouldn't win the nomination.

Meanwhile, the Internet gambling lobbying space is quickly getting crowded. Last week saw the launch of the Coalition for Consumer and Online Protection, which is in the throes of a $250,000 ad push against a federal online gambling ban.

Rep. Joe Barton's Internet Freedom Act, introduced last July, would create a market allowing the government to license and regulate online poker. States would be afforded autonomy to opt out of the system. The Texas Republican humorously suggested that God supports online gambling during a hearing in December.



What Do Terrorism and Online Poker Have in Common? - NationalJournal-com

In terms of Bitcoin casino legality, I think regulators are working on it already. Some actually have their legal rights to operate. The only thing that I fear against bitcoin casino is more on its technical aspects: scams, hackers and money laundering. We all know how genius money suckers are; if they want to steal your money or bitcoins they will find a way.

With almost two months of operation in the rear-view mirror, we may now be getting an accurate picture of the long-term potential for online poker in New Jersey.

That picture is of a market that can handily support two networks. But whether New Jersey will be able to reliably support additional networks over the long run remains an open question.
Traffic levels off as leaders remain entrenched

Data from the latest Scouting Report - a daily analysis publication produced by PokerScout-com covering the global online poker industry – shows that cash game traffic at NJ’s online poker rooms has reached what appears to be a plateau, with relatively steady levels stretching back to early January.

Market share remains relatively stable as well, with Party / Borgata continuing to hold a strong, albeit surmountable, lead at 41%. WSOP-com sits in second with 34% of the market and 888′s All American Poker Network occupies the third slot with a healthy 23%.

Meanwhile, Ultimate is banking that unique promotions such as the recently-announced Noverlay will help the room find traction in New Jersey. And Betfair remains closer to rumor than poker room. Looking back at the same report from late December, it’s clear that 888′s growth has come directly at the expense of Party / Borgata and, to a lesser degree, Ultimate Poker.
Factors that could shift the rankings

While overall traffic is likely to remain relatively flat in the near-term, there are a number of factors that could result in substantial redistribution of traffic between networks, including:

888 80% rakeback: The aggressive promotion has played no small part in 888′s growth over the last few weeks. But come May 1st when the promotion ends, it’s possible that much of 888′s traffic will vanish with it.
WSOP Satellites: Strong offline brands have proven to be a critical force in attracting NJ players, and the WSOP is just starting to roll out satellites to arguably the strongest land-based poker brand in the US – the World Series of Poker.
Innovation: Ultimate’s Noverlay promotion and their plan to introduce Two Street Holdem are just two example of the ways a room can act quickly and unilaterally to attempt to shake up the market.

Not losing will be the new winning

What’s the next phase for online poker in New Jersey? PokerScout looked to Nevada for lessons and cames back with an ominous warning:

If the market has indeed reached saturation, then the process took about nine weeks, 50% longer than it took for each of the Nevada sites to peak. In Nevada, the leveling off was followed by a slow decline of roughly 20%. Will the same happen in New Jersey? Only time will tell

If that is indeed the near-term future for NJ’s online poker sites, then we can expect operators to pivot their promotional strategies rapidly and aggressively to player retention, as opposed to acquisition.

New Jersey Online Poker Traffic Settles - Here's What's Next

Way back in December, a rep from Party Poker NJ asked players on the Two Plus Two forums for feedback regarding the $50k Guarantee, the flagship tournament of the Party / Borgata network.

And while players didn’t exactly respond in droves, enough data was collected to conclude that an earlier start time and a slightly revamped structure was the most viable solution.

No surprises there, as the super-deep structure and late starting time often resulted in a winner not being determined until nearly daybreak.
Initial attempt at change produced slight stumble

Last Monday, Party/Borgata answered the call by announcing sweeping changes to the $50k, including:

A 5 pm starting time.
A guaranteed $10k first-place prize; and
An improved blind structure.

The problem was the “improved” structure transformed the $50k into a deep stacked semi-turbo of sorts.

Instead of fusing or eliminating the early levels when players are 500 big blinds deep, several critical mid-tournament blind levels were eradicated altogether.

Abiding by this structure, New Jersey’s biggest weekly tournament would more closely resemble a virtual shove fest than one in which skillful pre and post-flop play was rewarded.

Compounding matters, those who registered near the end of the extended three hour late registration period would sit with under 20 big blinds – far less than ideal, given the relatively high buy-in.

Almost immediately after the announcement was made, several of Two Plus Two’s more active members responded to the changes:

“isuxatpokerbad” stated that “taking out the 250/500 and 600/1200 etc is just a tragedy that shouldn’t ever happen. That makes these blind jumps way too big in a crucial stage of the tournament.”
“Gags30″ mimicked the aforementioned sentiment, citing “i agree that the structure was simply too slow, and this could have been fixed in a number of ways…however, why on earth would you get rid of so many levels later in the tourney?”

Here’s where Party/Borgata impressed me

Four days before the newly implemented changes were set to roll-out, the Party rep announced a second change to the tournament’s structure.

The mid-blind levels were back, and several of the pre-ante blind levels were consolidated into one new 25/50 level.

Now, players would start with only 200 big blinds, but still have enough maneuverability to showcase their post-flop prowess. Suffice to say, the amendment was universally praised.

But how did the changes function in practice?
The New 50k Guaranteed hits the mark

The tournament lobby pretty much says it all: In total, 378 players showed up for the newly-restructured 50k Guaranteed.

That marks a 170 player increase over last week’s Super Bowl induced low point.
It also represents a 42% percent increase over its January 26th numbers, which given the circumstances are more indicative of the overhaul’s effect.

After an elongated struggle among its final three combatants, the $50k ended at exactly 3:04 am, over two hours earlier than the average pre-update completion time. Not bad, especially when you factor in the surplus of entries.

First-place paid out nearly $13,300, shattering the previous top prize record by a landslide. Even more impressive, second-place paid out more ($9,355.65) than first did the two weeks prior.

And while some players will argue that paying out approximately 19% of the field is still far too generous, overall Party/Borgata’s feedback-inspired upgrades proved widely successful.

That, and they didn’t have to give away a dime to make it happen. Unlike another site, which was willing to foot the entire bill of its Sunday Major.



NJ Online Poker Players Send Party / Borgata Tournament to New Record