Posts Tagged ‘online casino status’

Is Mr. President Serious Enough in Legalizing Online Gambling

Saturday, December 19th, 2009

President Barack Obama has been ushering many changes, whether it is health reform or economic incentives. Now, the question arises, is he serious enough to change the face of online gambling by legalizing the same? Many say that, he is very serious in legalizing online gambling.

One of the representatives of Merill Lynch has said that regulation on online gambling will ultimately be implemented instead of prohibition and that is only a matter of time.

Is UIGEA Concurrent with the Trade Agreement Between US and EU?

First of all, we should understand more about UIGEA to understand the point of contention between USA and European Union. The full form of UIGEA is Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act and was introduced in the US Congress in 2006. What was the purpose of introducing UIGEA? The purpose of introducing this act lies in preventing the financial institutions (FIs) of USA from transferring money to online gambling casinos. But UIGEA allows the FIs in transferring and dealing with money related to websites of lottery and horse racing.

But what is the Point of Contention between the two?

The claim made by the European Union emphasizes on the fact that Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 grossly violates the regulations of European Union in terms of trade agreements. According to industry experts, Bush administration ignored the entire allegation but Obama administration is giving importance to the matter.

So, what can be the Outcome?

President Obama has not yet disclosed his stance on online gambling but he surely is in favor of working with EU and the UN on the matter of online gambling legalization. In fact, industry experts believe that legalization as well as perfect regulation of online gambling would lead to a great inflow of tax revenues to the government coffers. This revenue earning will in turn help the ailing US economy to get the well-needed boost up.

Can UIGEA be Revoked?

Rep. Barney Frank is surely confident of revoking UIGEA during the first part of 2010. UIGEA was supposed to be implemented on 1st of December 2009 but it was deferred. A breather of 6 months is allowed by the congress to discuss and come to a final conclusion on this matter. Rep. Barney is garnering support in repealing the UIGEA within these 6 months time.

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Online Gambling Regulation is Preferred by Experts Rather than Banning it

Monday, December 7th, 2009

Experts are slowly but steadily coming together in support of a new legislation to regulate online gambling. One of the major development in this respect is the fact that almost all experts have leaned against online gambling ban. According to them, a ban on online casino gambling has not served the purpose of restricting American people from online gambling.

One of the Expert is Parry Aftab of WiredSafety

One of the well-renowned person who supported online gambling regulation over a complete ban is Mr. Parry Aftab. He is the Director of WiredSafety, an organization which tries to safe guard online gambling aficionados from possible fraud, restricting child exposure to unethical websites, etc. He has clearly spoken in favor of online gambling regulation. Parry has also pointed out the inefficacy of total online-gambling-ban by putting forward some startling facts and statistics. According to the statistics, around 3 million American youth gamble online at once per week and almost 6 million youth play online gambling games at least once per month.

Thus, he supported the idea of regulating online gambling immediately but not banning it. A regulated gambling online market will definitely help the American people.

Financial Industry and Online Gambling

Experts from financial industry also testified in front of the House Financial Services Committee and they clearly opined that the financial industry should not be held accountable of regulating online casino gambling industry. This is not a new stance of the financial industry. They have been vocal about this from the time UIGEA was implemented.

UIGEA, Online Gambling and Barney Frank

Barney Frank has been a proponent of online freedom and has been vocal against UIGEA from the year 2006. In the hearing before  House Financial Services Committee, Barney has described why UIGEA is bad for US people. According to him, people of America should have the right to gamble online and internet freedom should be restored. He has also opined that every precaution should be undertaken for   making online gambling safe and secure.

More Hearings

More hearings will take place on online gambling in the coming 6 months, up to 1st June 2010, the date of UIGEA implementation. More and more experts would be called in for hearing. Whether their plea of regulating rather than banning online gambling altogether will be taken into account by the Committee is a million dollar question. The only thing we can do is wait, watch and gather more voices in favor of repealing UIGEA.

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Are Casino IPOs Losing Public Interest? Why and How Long?

Tuesday, December 1st, 2009

On the last day of November, i.e. 30.11.09, the renowned Sands Casino had floated its well coveted Macau Resort IPO. But weak debut of Sands China is casting doubt in the minds of industry analysts. Sands China has seen a steep drop of around 10% in its stock price on the very first day of its trading. According to industry news, this is the 4th largest drop in valuation of a Casino IPO in the last 1 year.

Experts are pointing at two main reasons of such poor performance of Sands China IPO:

  • High valuation of the casino IPOs (US$ 2.5 billion).
  • Poor performance of the rival Macau casino, Wynn Macau. In the month of October 2009, IPO of Wynn Macau casino was floated. The listing was done at USD 1.87 billion but after that its price tumbled by 5%.
  • Dubai debt crisis has also been shown as one of the reasons behind the poor performance of Sands China IPO.

According to the director of asset management company called CASH Asset Management, Patrick Yiu, the excessive demand for casino stock has ended. This demand will revive once again when more and more businesses will participate in the casino industry. More competition will ensure that the business outlook of the industry is positive. This, in turn, will help regain the investor confidence.

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Titan Poker starts off with ECOOPV

Wednesday, November 25th, 2009

Last 23rd November, 2009 was an important day for the online poker players at Titan Poker. It was on this date that the Titan Poker started with its ECOOP V or the European Championship of Online Poker for the 5th time. With more than $4.5 million on stake in the remaining 13 events, players are sure to get the best out of this gaming tournament.

Tournament schedule

The tournament schedule of Titan Poker have been put together in such a way to make way for more and more players to participate in as many events as they like to. One tournament will be held each day thus offering convenience for players to take part in more tournaments possible.

Take a note that the massive prize pools will be included in the events to be held on Sundays. Out of the other Sunday prize pools in line, the Sunday, December 6, event will include the largest prize pool. A huge amount of $1.5 million can be won from this main event.

Event summary on 23.11.09 and 24.11.09

Yesterday’s event (24.11.09) was on Limit 7 Card Stud tourney that offered $250 as buy in and a total of $50 K as prize pool. The very first event was played in the format of No Limit Hold’em. It is reported that more than 1 thousand players had registered to play the tournament.

The No Limit Hold’em event lasted for more than 7 hours. The winning amount went to a Greek man (Thanasis 1982) who bagged a hefty amount of $52,500. Runner up of the event was a French player (Avalika) who earned $27,500 from the same event.

More on offer, not money but convenience

Titan Poker knows that many players may not have a sufficient bankroll or funds to take part in ECOOP events. Especially for these players, Titan is running the satellite tournaments awarding seats at a fraction of the total cost. The satellites will be operating 24×7 for all scheduled events.

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Online Casino Status and Tax Confusion

Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

Is there a clear definition in federal law regarding legality of online casinos? NO. This unclear stance of the federal law is creating confusion among people while filing their tax returns. new-casino-tax-squeezing-profits

Moreover, Department of Justice is posing in a peculiar manner by treating online gambling as illegal. But as per Federal law is concerned, there is no law in the US still now that prohibits online casino gambling. This is the reason many online players are finding it tough to judge whether to file tax returns on earnings from online casino gambling.

In an article published in Wall Street Journal, it has been stated that IRS does not have any policy regarding online casino gambling. IRS puts everything under the wagering group of tax returns. All winnings of an online gambler needs to be declared and losses are deductible. The concerned article also points out that there are some states which are not as accommodating as the other US states. One of such state is California. According to the the spokesperson of the taxation department of California, taxpayers are solely responsible to provide proof of deduction. The obvious meaning of such a policy is that the winnings of an online gambler remains taxable while no credit is given to losses.

It is significant to mention that a total of six states have denied online casino gambling in entirety. But in the rest of the states the confusion persists. Thus, it has become very important for every US state to clearly mention the status of online gambling to clear the doubts regarding taxation on online gambling.

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