USA Poker Updates for December 2009
Please visit the US poker sites page for updated gatherings.
December 30
3:30am – Very slow news reporting other than Pokerstars.com, the largest US site breaking another milestone of simultaneous players at once. They hit almost 37,000 at once on Sunday. That makes them nearly 4 times larger than they were prior to the UIGEA in 2006 (wow it’s weird to think it was that long ago).
December 25
12:20pm – Merry Xmas everyone! Traffic to the poker sites has slowed down considerably both yesterday and today. But, the week before Christmas Eve poker sites were seeing record numbers. Pokerstars as usual seeing the biggest gains in traffic for the week prior, along with Full Tilt seeing similiar traffic boosts. I suspect it’s being caused by all the college kids off school and at home for Christmas. Most non-US accepted networks are not seeing such high peaks in players.
December 23
10:19pm – It’s been slow news reporting on anything US related, which is good. Most people are still talking about Dikshit pleading guilty, with an obvious disapproval by the PPA. Lingering talk about the Kentucky domain seizure is proving good for us with positive points made during the appeals court. Arguments are likely to reverse this decision for Kentucky poker players. Also, slight delays are being reported in echeck cashouts at Pokerstars and wire transfer withdraws at Full Tilt. Have a good Christmas! I will keep posting through the Holidays if anything important comes up.
December 21
10:10pm – I wanted to put up a quick warning for anyone who plays at or played at Cardspike while we had them listed for 1 month as a US site. They are owned by certain industry individuals that are NOT acting responsibly. Players are having problems receiving cash and so are affiliates associated with the site. We had them as “reputable” because we were working with an affiliate manager that is very reputable in the industry that was hired by Cardspike. He got fired, the place went to hell in a hand basket and they are now labeled as a chop shop by us. Just a warning!
1:58am – Players at some forums are reporting slow withdraws via echecks at Pokerstars. Deposits seem to still be going through but seems they having problems with their echeck processor on the withdraw side so expect delays….or get in contact with support and ask if there is a faster way to withdraw.
December 19
7:44pm – Here is the video for J. Todds video Perspectives Weekly weekly. He talks about Partygaming and Dikshit news. There’s also some more affiliate related stuff towards the end. Kind of a funny show this week.
December 18
5:55pm – This may be old news but my partner asked if echecks were available to all US players now at Fulltiltpoker.com and the support response was yes. So if you were waiting for echecks as an option at FTP, there you go. Sorry if this is old news but I don’t believe it is.
2:18am – Dikshit pleaded guilty to violating the Wire Act yesterday and agreed to pay the $300 million. Not a bad gig if you ask me considering how much he made during his time with Partygaming. He will also have 2 years before he is possibly sentenced to prison (for up to 2 years).
December 16
5:41am – Anurag Dikshit one of Partygaming founders is reportedly settling with the US government for $300 million dollars and possibly 2 years in jail (yea right). According to Dikshit, the amount is much lower than what is being reported although he would not comment on the actual amount. Dikshit will appear in a New York court today.
December 13
4:04am – So the Court of Appeals heard the arguments regarding the blocking of domains by Kentucky. Most of the articles are giving a positive spin on things so hopefully this entire case will be dismissed and online poker in Kentucky will continue once again. A ruling is expected shortly according to Brennan of iMEGA.
December 12
2:05am – Doylesroom is expected to relaunch to US players in 4 weeks. As to what network they will be on, they will not say.
December 11
7:53pm - I received an interesting email from someone who works in the financial industry about my last post about echecks. He wanted to stay unamious but he felt the statements regarding echecks were incorrect. The reasoning seems logical so I am going to post it, but I will leave certain things out to protect us who use echecks from helping out the wrong person.
“Well remember to use the ACH system you must have a US company processing the transactions. The issue is that the overseas company’s are masking the transactions. So it’s just a matter of time before ( company removed ) figures out what is going on. Echecks could go down any day. Just a matter of when regardless of the UIGEA or not.”
1:38am - I wanted to get clarification on echeck poker deposits for US players once the UIGEA goes into effect at the end of 2009. For anyone who use echecks and are concerned about the future of depositing with them here is what I. Nelson Rose of Gamblingandthelaw.com had to say about them. From the looks of it, echecks will be working same as usual after the UIGEA. I mean who knows if you’re using the check to buy a t-shirt or to deposit into a poker site.
Me: Do you know if instant echecks will be affected (like Pokerstars and Fulltilt use) when the regulations go into effect or is this kind of unknown?
Professor Rose: No one knows. But since no one is going to be asking regular players where they are sending their money, and money sent by operators to players does not fall under the UIGEA, if the payment processor is overseas it should continue to operate with no interference.
December 8
3:35am – I’ve come across this question quite a few times in the poker forums I read on a daily basis. People are still concerned about depositing after the UIGEA is implemented at the end of 2009. The major concern is credit cards, because that happens to be the most widely used form of depositing, even though a lot of people still can’t use their CC to deposit. Plus it’s how the “fish” usually deposit. On a side note, SOOOO many more people would play poker if all credit cards were accepted. At sites that are good at making CC deposits go through, usually 1 in 7 hits to a site creates a real money depositor (yes they are out there but Im not going to mention the gambling site). Sites that aren’t so good at it, it’s usually 1 per every 50-100. But anyway, back to the original question. The answer is no, we will likely see little if any change with credit card deposits after the UIGEA is implemented. This is coming straight from I. Nelson Rose himself in a podcast I heard at pocketfives.
December 3 – Add absolutepoker to the states to block Kentucky. As far as I know, only Pokerstars and Full Tilt are the only two willing to fight this ruling. Hopefully the Kentucky Court of Appeals will see the bright side and reverse this. We shall see what happens on December 12th.
