Online Gaming

Whether or not it is a sport is debatable, but poker (and other gambling activities) has been severely affected by the Unlawful Internet Gaming Enforcement Act. See WaPo article here. Espn and FSN televise poker tournaments on a loop, so let's cede that it's a sport for now. . .

Party Poker has already stopped taking deposits and wagers from American "players," saying as much on their site: "The United States Congress has passed a bill that seeks to prevent you from playing cash poker online. If, as expected, [it's already happened, ed.] that bill is signed into law by President Bush. . .many of your favorite sites will cease taking deposits and wagers from American players and that includes your very favorite--partypoker.com." I am close to a "professional" who made his living playing poker on that site. But no longer, as he is now blocked.

With American players now limited in their access to so much poker, advertising revenues from websites like Party Poker should decrease or even disappear. The same goes for the televised tournaments since interest will wane.

I posit that there is a way around the law for these athletes, however. The law is geared toward preventing financial institutions from processing transactions intended to be used for online gaming. Well if one opens up a foreign bank account (the more protective the country's laws the better--Antigua, Cayman Islands), then one's domestic bank would not know the money is then being wired into these gambling websites. This is the process required at Tradesports--introduced to me by a law professor of mine--which is a favorite of American traders (and even has predictive value). For now Tradesports seems safe from regulation, but we'll see what happens in 270 days, when the law is implemented.

Update

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