Online Casino News and Information

Software developer Playtech Limited has purchased the gambling platform provider Virtue Fusion Limited for an initial payment of £29 million. This amount will be subject to a set of agreed working capital adjustments. There will also be an additional payment of up to £7 million in the first quarter of 2011 based on the performance of Virtue Fusion during 2010.

Virtue Fusion was founded in 1999 and has a peak player base of more than 6000  players. It also has a growing business in European countries. Virtue Fusion provides turnkey solutions to other popular brands. Mor Weizer, CEO for Playatech stated: “The acquisition places Playtech in a leading position in international online bingo markets, complementing our leading position in poker and casino and, following the GTS acquisition, as a content provider…It reflects our ongoing commitment to provide licensees with a comprehensive portfolio of best-of-breed gaming products”.

 All of Virtue Fusion’s key personnel have signed contracts to remain with the company for a minimum of 2 years.

Bob McCulloch, CEO of Virtue Fusion, stated that they are delighted to be a part of Playtech. “This deal will ensure our operators continue to benefit from the market-leading Virtue Fusion bingo product and, in addition, can now profit from Playtech’s greater international reach and access to a wider games portfolio.”

This breaking news!!!

15 February 2010 – Following a number of Internet-based allegations concerning the closure of the Grand Privé Affiliate Program (‘the Program’) on 1 December 2008, eCOGRA’s Compliance and Advisory Services department was engaged by the management of the company on 17 November 2009.

Pursuant to an independent and fair resolution of the issues involved, eCOGRA was tasked with:

1. Independently investigating the manner in which the Program was terminated and the reasons therefore;
2. Carrying out a full and independent review of the program software and data to confirm amounts owed to claimants;
3. Determining a fair settlement for claimants, taking into consideration the potential lifetime earnings of each affiliate’s respective players; and
4. Compiling a full and transparent report which will be publicly released on conclusion of the investigation.

You can find the full report here.

The initial webmaster reaction indicates that legacy players from the original version of  the Grand Prive affiliate program, called Referspot, may have been untagged pursuant to closure of the affiliate program. There is a general outcry regarding the very LOW amounts being distributed for compensation.

This last month has seen some interesting developments in the ongoing online gaming wars. Visa and MasterCard started getting gung-ho against their cardholders using their cards on egaming sites.

The crackdown was the result of the soon coming implementation of the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act (UIGEA) this coming summer. UIGEA is designed to prevent banks and other monetary processing companies from processing payments to online gambling sites.

The card companies were cracking down on the practice of operators re-recording’7995’ egaming transactions as another form of commerce, thus helping gamblers in the United States and others to continue to use their cards to continue online gambling.

Read the full story and some legal views here.

Missouri State Representatives Jason Grill and Mike Colona have enlisted in the war on sports betting. They have put forth House Concurrent Resolution 22, calling on congress to repeal the Federal Professional and Amateur Sports Promotion Act (PASPA) of 1992. The proposal asks congress to repeal PASPA and allow states that wish to do so, to offer sports betting and thus partake in the economic benefits. This would include the estimated $81.5 million legally bet on last year’s Super Bowl.

PASPA prohibits all states, except four (Montana, Delaware, Oregon and Nevada) from allowing sports betting. Those four were grandfathered in because of an experiment, however brief it was, of parlay sports betting in 1976.

There are other challenges to this ban at the federal level. New Jersey has sued the federal government claiming that this exemption is discriminatory against the other 46 states not allowed to offer sports betting.

Iowa legislators have proposed introduced legislation allowing sports betting if PASPA is repealed.

The resolution states that Missouri would benefit greatly from the ban being lifted, resulting in increased tourism and gaming revenues.

SecureTrading Inc., the new U.S. subsidiary of UC Group Ltd, has opened for business in expectation of legislation legalizing and regulating online gambling will soon pass in the U.S. UC Group is a United Kingdom based payments processing company.

Chris Thom, chairman of SecureTrading Inc., is a former chief risk officer for MasterCard. SecureTrading says that it has many services which will be needed as soon as online gaming becomes legal. Among those services are player registration, verification and validation. This is to make sure that the applying players are of legal age and in a location where the new online gaming is legal.

SecureTrading is also involved in payment processing, procedures to prevent money laundering, fraud tools, tax collection and computation, and settlement and reporting. They also provide tools to help problem gamblers.

Chris Thom says: “As Congress prepares to take the final step, SecureTrading Inc.’s turnkey system is primed to enable our customers to go live the moment Internet gambling is regulated.”

Read the full story!

On Monday, the New Jersey State Senate Committee on Government, Wagering, Tourism and Historic Preservation, approved a bill sponsored by Raymond Lesniak, calling for a referendum on sports wagering. The bill passed by a 4 – 0 margin. Can intrastate internet gambling be far behind?

Lesniak, citing figures from the Press of Atlantic City, stated: “legalized sports betting would raise $100 million in new state revenues and generate $500 million for the casinos and racetracks.”

Joe Brennan, Chairman of iMEGA (Interactive Media Entertainment and Gaming Association), stated that he expected legalized intrastate online gaming to be next. He states that there should be much less resistance to internet gambling with the passage of sports betting. Raymond Lesniak has also introduced a bill to allow internet gambling. Sports betting is still not a sure thing in New Jersey yet. It requires a constitutional amendment in order to become legal. Brennan states that it still has a long way to go.

Sports wagering could be on the ballot in New Jersey in November for a public referendum. Another hurdle could be the Senate Budget Committee. Since legalized sports betting would impact the budget, the Budget committee may want to take a look at it. But Brennan doesn’t think they will do that until after the referendum.

In the meantime, Barney Frank (D-MA) has a bill on Capitol Hill which aims to legalize and regulate internet gambling in the United States. The bill now has 65 co-sponsors.

UIGEA was first passed in 2006, after being snuck into the Safe Ports Act, with the supposed purpose of stopping terrorists from moving funds around by use of online casinos. The fact that there has never been any evidence of that in the public sector since it’s passage, has not stopped it’s supporters from wanting it enforced.

At the recent Cybercrime in Betting and Gaming conference in London, it was reported that security forces are now involved in conducting 23 current investigations. These investigations suggest that it may be possible that terrorists may have used online casinos to transfer money. It is a sure bet that the anti-online gaming forces will be using this as a weapon to help keep online gaming illegal in the United States.

The leads are apparently coming from three men convicted to inciting murder through web site exhortations. They are reported to have used Windows based Trojans in order to steal credit card numbers. After getting the credit card numbers, the money is laundered through the use of online casinos.

The three made over $3.5 million in fraudulent charges using stolen card numbers, stolen using phishing schemes and the use of Trojans. They made over 350 different transactions.

This information was made available at the conference by Robert Mitchell, Director of World Check. He stated these investigations could be much worse than they appear because they involve transnational groups using many countries in Europe and Asia. He said that the volume of money involved in staggering.

World Check is a private intelligence company. It works with an assists most of the world’s top banks and enforcement and regulatory agencies, and shares it’s databases of “heightened risk individuals and businesses” with them.

Fueled by millions of dollars from overseas gambling companies, and encouraged by the Obama administration’s delay in the enforcement of UIGEA, poker lobbyists are gearing up to for an all out fight to legalize internet gambling in the United States this year.

Spearheaded by Rep. Barney Frank (D – Mass), Democrats in congress are pushing to pass legislation which would legalize and regulate many online betting games, such as poker, blackjack, majongg and others.

The popularity of table gaming has exploded in recent years in the U.S. This is evidenced by the growth of land based casinos, big and small, in an ever growing number of states. The U.S. accounts for over half of the $16 billion worldwide internet gambling market.

Proponents point out that fact and the millions, if not billions of dollars the government would realize in taxes and fees from legalized and regulated gambling.

Opponents say that legalized internet gambling would increase criminal activity, dramatically increase the incidences of gambling addiction and would be a great threat to children. Senators have placed holds on six Treasury Dept. nominees to protest the delay in enforcement of UIGEA, the anti-gambling law.

Read the full story from The Washington Post.

BolaVerde Media Group (BVMG) recently released a new Internet Gambling Federal Lobbying report which estimates that $3.65 million was spent lobbying the U.S. government over online gambling during the third quarter of 2009. This was from both supporters and opponents. This money is a 50% increase from the previous year.

Mark Balestra, Managing Director for BVMG, states that they know that regulated internet gambling is going to happen and that they have a good feeling about who the big players will be in that market. He says that the increased lobbying spending is expected to continue this year and that new contributors will enter into the game.

 Leading the spending frenzy were Harrah’s Entertainment Inc., UC Group Limited and the Interactive Gaming Council. Their combined spending was $2.04 million, or 55.9% of the total. This is money spent in favor of online gaming.

As can be seen in the above figures, there are many on both sides of this debate. This includes the federal government. While many in the government are looking to repeal UIGEA, there are still many who want to keep online gambling illegal for U.S. citizens.

iGaming Business reports that Harrah’s spent $2.41 million in the fourth quarter of 2009 trying to overturn UIGEA. The total spent in the fourth quarter was a 50% increase compared to 2008.

“An assessment of lottery spend also lends insight into what the regulatory model will look like and who stands to benefit,” said Balestra.

Gambling, whether in land based casinos or online, is big business with millions of dollars at stake. It stirs peoples emotions and their wallets. That is why so much has been spent on repealing or enforcing UIGEA and why it will contunue to be spent until someone makes a decision.

The battle over the life or death of UIGEA is an ongoing battle that remains in the headlines. It would be wise for all players in the game to take a look at who is doing what to influence the decision making process.

Playtech, the largest supplier of online gaming software, has released the new, revolutionary Mobile Web Apps. This software brings many gambling games, such as Texas hold em poker, blackjack, craps, and video poker, straight to a cell phone or other personal mobile device. The software places a strong emphasis on security and safety.

Other games included in Playtech’s new app are bingo, and slots. This has mouths watering because Playtech already has large progressive jackpots running on this software.

The problem is that most U.S. subscribers haven’t been able to play gambling games on their mobile appliances because of UIGEA. Most online casinos and gambling companies stopped providing services to U.S. customers to avoid prosecution under UIGEA. Players who have tried Playtech are writing members of congress to repeal UIGEA so that they can play the new games.