Government Seizes Online Poker Sites Possibly Killing the Market

Poker intrigues me; It's a combination of luck and critical thinking. The luck is based on the cards dealt but the critical thinking comes from considering all the factors before choosing to play the hand. In poker and in life, the same cards dealt should not always be played the same. But I do not play poker. I don’t play poker because I will not risk my hard earned money. I believe poker is a game for those that can afford to lose as much as they want to win and who have the will to play moderately.

Of and on, I watch “Poker After Dark” (although I haven’t watched in a month). I am well aware of the various poker sites that exist, considering almost all commercials during the show promote these sites and the players tend to wear emblems during the game. On most commercials for poker sites, the commercials tend to always exclaim you can play for free. This I know to be a lie because some professional poker players started off playing cash games online. I began to wonder the reasons behind promoting the site as free when most know it’s used for gambling. Well, the government knows this too and has seized many poker sites on Friday.

According to “Online Poker Players Face Big Life Changes” by Alexandra Berzon of the Wall Street Journal online,

“The U.S. Justice Department shut down Full Tilt Poker on Friday, along with other online poker sites, accusing 11 people of bank fraud and of illegally operating gambling websites. The government seized accounts run by the sites that held money stored by players.”

The government and poker sites have been back-and-forth through the years over the legality of online poker. For one, the government believes it’s gambling and when they made it illegal to gamble online in the U.S., most sites moved their operations overseas. It is also illegal for sites to allow people to use their bank accounts to pay for the gambling. The government is accusing the poker sites of charging accounts and creating fake “merchants” to disguise the payments. For example, bank statements would list a transaction/ transfer as coming from company xyz instead of Full Tilt Poker.

According to PokerScout, a company keeping track of online poker sites, “[poker] sites saw around $16 billion in wagers from U.S. players last year, with the bulk of that taken in by Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars”. With major endorsements by casinos and professional poker players and now the seizure of the sites, these online poker sites are going to lose a lot of money and support. I read from Wall Street Journal a few casinos ended their business relationship with any sites that were indicted.

While Poker is usually seen as a social game, enjoyed amongst friends or in the atmosphere of a casino, the article reports many play online because players can play multiple games at once (I don’t exactly know the winning strategy when focus is decreased per extra game played). One online player was quoted as stating he could play 500 tournaments in a week online. With a casino, where one has to be present and science hasn’t developed the ability to be in more than one place, 500 in a week are impossible.

Now, online players must transition to casinos, find other sites not seized, or quit. Businesses catering to the online poker community will have to move on from online sites. Realistically, I don’t see the sites popping back up anytime soon. As far as professional poker and “Poker After Dark”, which has online poker sponsors, I wouldn’t know until I see a new episode this coming week if the commercials have been pulled. For online sites, they can still operate outside the U.S. but the U.S. online poker market seems dead. I think the lesson to be learned is that when the jig is up, it’s time to fold. This is going to be a long legal battle and even if won, the U.S. government will always be an enemy of online poker.