Most of the mass media already call it the Black Friday, as the big 3 on the American online poker market (FullTilt, PokerStars and AP/UB) have been indicted by the FBI and whilst most poker players cannot understand the reasoning behind it, the accusations are very serious and the future for these poker sites is not clear yet. The first step for all 4 was the change from their .com domains to European versions and all this was done within 48 hours after the press release of the Department of Justice (DoJ) has been published and caused a bush fire on the online poker scene.
Pokerstars.com = Pokerstars.eu
FullTiltPoker.com = FullTiltPoker.co.uk
AbsolutePoker.com = AbsolutePoker.eu
UB.com = UBPoker.eu
Just for clarification though, the FBI and the DoJ are not after the players and officially, online poker is not illegal either. The most critical part is the funding of said poker accounts and the poker sites and their management has encouraged banks to process transactions that are not in accordance with the UIGEA from 2006.
The list contains crimes such as conspiracy to violate the Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, operating an illegal gambling business and conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud as well as being part of a money laundering conspiracy. In total, the government is seeking at least $3 billion in forfeitures and penalties from the poker sites involved.
Whilst Pokerstars and FullTiltPoker have already booted American players from their real money tables and just a few lucky ones remain active since they haven’t logged out yet since Monday, they can’t transfer their money via p2p to non US friends either and withdrawals get denied. This is obviously an understandable procedure to get control over the current situation and also avoid money dumping outside of the US. They also cut all regular guaranteed prizes and lost up to 48% of their traffic compared to last week.
On AbsolutePoker and UB, p2p for US players have also been disabled and despite a pop up earlier today on AP, players can still play for real money. Deposits and withdrawals are not possible for Americans and right now and it remains unsure if they will leave the US market or not. VictoryPoker, a skin of the Cake Network that intended to switch to the Cereus network has since left the network and will probably pull out of the US market.
Smaller networks such as Everleaf, Cake, Merge or Yatahay (DoylesRoom) could see an increase of traffic and new sign ups over the past 48 hours already and also Bodog was one of the benefiters of the Black Friday. CakePoker has already indicated that they will not pull out of the US market unless something big changes and every skin can decide if they want to opt out or not.
In general, most online poker players are scared and unsure what will happen in the near future, since the biggest names from an American point of view have been taken down – will the smaller networks be able to attract more players and also create more trust or does the whole online poker business take a massive hit?
Non US poker sites and networks have already launched new promotions to attract grinders that previously played on the big 3 sites and took advantage of the traffic there, some announced increased player benefits if they can prove the VIP status on the other poker sites. The next few days and weeks will surely see more action and marketing efforts, especially bwin / Party Poker as well as 888poker have seen profits on the stock market on Monday.
The full extent of the whole situation is probably not revealed yet and players should remain in a “wait and see” position and not try to dump money to non US friends when they are still able to play. The security departments will surely have a closer look on all non US withdrawals and it doesn’t make much sense to risk having your accounts locked just to help out friends.
One of the big questions that remains for both, US and non US players is the safety of their funds – all player funds are kept on different bank accounts, yet the FBI and Interpol have already released a list with the names of banks and bank accounts that are suspected of previously mentioned crimes and are currently under investigation. Will the players see their funds anytime soon or are they lost? Even though the sites ensure that the funds are safe, ultimately it still remains a mystery and doesn’t increase the trust right now.
What you should do as player right now:
1) Log into the poker clients and take a screenshot of your balances just in case
2) Do not try to dump cash to non US players on sites that still allow you to play for real money
3) Do not panic and rather take action: http://theppa.org/takeaction/
Most online poker news sites keep players updated and if you have an account at twitter, you can also follow the following people for important updates:
@Kevmath
@Pokerati
@oskargarcia
@GamingCounsel
@ckrafcik
@grange95
@scarlet_lv
@markgahagan
@bjnemeth
@ftrainpoker
@taopauly
@hardboiledpoker
@ralstonflash
@taxdood
@joebrennanjr
@pokerscout1
Hopefully we will soon be able to post more promising updates, but as of now there is not much that can be done as everyone is still trying to gather as much info as possible.
Edit: It seems that FullTiltPoker has now forced the log out for American players within the US, yet Americans outside of the US are still able to play for real money on their accounts. At PokerStars, Americans outside of the US are not able to play for cash right now.
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