New York Online Poker Bill Springs to Life, Passes First Committee Vote

The legalization of online poker in the state of New York seems to be back on the agenda, as members of the Senate Racing, Gaming, and Wagering Committee passed overwhelmingly a bill on the matter earlier this week.

The piece of legislation was the now well-known S3898, which was originally introduced in the New York State Legislature last January by Sen. John Bonacic. During the 2017 portion of the legislative session, the bill passed the Senate and was referred to the Assembly, where it died. This means that the piece will now have to receive an approval from the Senate before being sent to the lower chamber of the state Legislature for a vote.

The bill gained quite some momentum last year, so it is believed that a successful passage in the Senate would not be such a difficult task to accomplish. In other words, it seems that the success of S38989 and the future of regulated online poker in the state is highly dependent on the Assembly.

The lower chamber of the New York Legislature presented its own online poker bill last year. However, it did not progress as much as its Senate counterpart. Assemblyman Gary Pretlow, Chairman of the Assembly’s Racing, Gaming, and Wagering Committee, led the Assembly’s poker push last year. In fact, the lawmaker told media late in 2018 that he planned to renew his online poker legalization effort in February 2018.

Following its positive vote earlier this week, the Senate’s online poker bill was reported to the Finance Committee, which it will have to pass in order to be referred to the full Senate floor for a vote.

”Bad Actor” and Other Key Provisions

Generally speaking, S3898 designates online poker as a game of skill, and not one whose outcome is based on chance. This classification is particularly important, as the New York State Constitution prohibits any form of gambling expansion within the state’s borders, and any gambling expansion requires an amendment to the current laws.

If online poker is legalized, interested operators will be able to apply for licenses and provide Texas Hold’em and Omaha Hold’em games to New York players. There will be a total of eleven licenses for online poker operators to be issued by regulators.

Each and every successful license applicant will have to pay a one-off licensing fee of $10 million. The money will go to the state coffers. Online poker proponents in the Legislature also believe that the legalization and regulation of online poker will generate significant additional tax revenue. Under S3898A, licenses operators will be taxed at 15% on their revenue.

Last year, the Senate sneaked a “bad actor” provision to its bill in hopes to help it navigate through the Assembly successfully. The provision bans operators that had continued operating in the US in the post-UIGEA era from applying for licenses in New York. In other words, PokerStars would not be welcome in the state, if the bill gains the necessary support in the Legislature.

The Stars Group, parent company of the popular poker brand, has been a staunch supporter of New York’s legalization effort. However, the “bad actor” provision may thus cost the state a mighty player in the online poker field.

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Aleksandr Shevelev Leads WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open Championship Final Table

The official six-handed final table of this year’s WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open Championship was set last night, and it will be Russian player Aleksandr Shevelev who will lead the pack of six into today’s final day of action.

The player emerged the chip leader for a second consecutive day, although he had his ups and downs throughout Tuesday action at the host casino, Seminole Hard Rock in Hollywood, Florida.

Ness Reilly took the lead at some point on Day 4 of the $3,500 buy-in tournament and gained quite some pace to increase her advantage. Reilly came fresh from an eight-place finish in the WPTDeppStacks Hollywood Main Event, which took place last week at the same host venue and as part of the larger Lucky Hearts Poker Open festival.

Winning a massive pot, Shevelev managed to narrow the gap that his female fellow player had created, and eventually took the lead to never let go of it throughout the rest of the day. The Russian player bagged and tagged 6.96 million in chips last night, good for 116 big blinds.

Shevelev currently has a little over $22,500 in live tournament earnings. The player has cashed in four live tournaments so far, all of which have taken place at Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, Florida. In other words, a victory in the Lucky Hearts Poker Open Championship could become the young Russian’s debut among poker’s heavyweights.

The player made two in-the-money finishes in this year’s Lucky Hearts Poker Open festival. Being among the final six, the player has locked a six-figure payout from the Championship tournament. Each of the six finalists is guaranteed a minimum cash of $104,784.

The Final Pack of Six

Aside from Shevelev, the official final table also includes former WPT Main Tour Main Event champion Andy Frankenberger, who will enter the final day of play as the short stack with 2.17 million, Alan Krockey (2.81 million), Brett Bader (3.16 million), Darryll Fish (5.92 million), and Ness Reilly (6.295 million).

The six players will return to the host casino at noon Florida time to play down to a champion. And the winner will collect a nice payout of $511,604, which includes an entry fee into the season-ending WPT Tournament of Champions. The WPT announced on Tuesday that the event will take place over May 24-26 at Aria Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, with the final table being slated to be played at the newly opened eSports Arena Las Vegas at Luxor Hotel and Casino.

As mentioned above, Andy Frankenberger is the sole surviving WPT Champions Club member in the Lucky Hearts Poker Open Championship. The player won his title back in 2010, when he topped the field of the Legends of Poker $5,000 Championship Event. Apart from his performance in the WPT, the player has also won two WSOP gold bracelets over the course of his career.

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Another delay hits the opening of Macau’s luxury The 13 hotel

In Macau, local hotel developer The 13 Holdings Limited has reportedly announced that it has again postponed the opening of its The 13 property and does not now expect to begin welcoming guests to the luxury venue until the end of April. Costing approximately $1.6 billion to build, The 13 had originally been due to commence operations on a 65,000 sq ft plot of land near the border between the Cotai and Coloane districts of Macau last July but this deadline was later missed after the developer ran out of usable cash. The 13 Holdings Limited, which was previously known as Louis XIII Holdings Limited until a 2016 name-change, subsequently floated a March 31 opening date as it undertook steps to raise additional funds. According to reports from Asia Gaming Brief and GGRAsia, one of these actions reportedly saw the developer initiate a capital reorganization program that it explained would allow it to save approximately $223.5 million by consolidating shares and reducing exposure. Hong Kong-listed The 13 Holdings Limited has now reportedly declared that it hopes to open The 13 ‘on or before’ April 30 while additionally stating that it already holds all of the necessary non-gaming licenses from the Macau Government Tourism Office. “Additional time was required by both the company and the valuer for the preparation and the due diligence works in respect of the valuation assessment on The 13 hotel project, which resulted in delays in the expected timetable for the rights issue,” reportedly read a statement from The 13 Holdings Limited. “The hotel opening, as at the latest practicable date, is expected to be on or before April 30, 2018.” Regarding rumors that The 13 may one day feature a casino, The 13 Holdings Limited reportedly proclaimed that the authorization to operate any such venue remains ‘subject to the approval of the Macau government’ and, therefore, the likelihood that such an enterprise will open ‘remains an uncertainty’.

Fourth Las Vegas hotel in the works for Steve Wynn

Las Vegas will soon be home to another Wynn Resorts Ltd. (WYNN:NASDAQ GS) property as casino magnate Steve Wynn reportedly told shareholders on Monday that he is planning to build a fourth hotel on the site of the former Frontier. Bloomberg reports that the 38-acre site acquired by Wynn Resorts Ltd. in December 2017 for $336 million, is located just across the Strip from Wynn’s pair of existing properties, Encore and Wynn, which will be linked via an “air-conditioned umbilical hallway” to the new 2,500-room hotel, Wynn reportedly said on a conference call Monday. According to KSNV Channel 3 Las Vegas, the new hotel is called “Wynn West.” The publicly traded company based on the Las Vegas Strip is also building Paradise Park. The proposed 20-acre lagoon project is reportedly to be built on what is now an 18-hole golf course situated just east of Wynn Las Vegas and Encore and would be surrounded by a new 1,000-room hotel tower and convention center, a white-sand beach and a boardwalk. Last year reports indicated that work on the first phase of Wynn Paradise Park would begin by the end of 2017 or in early 2018. On the call Monday, Wynn said, “Hotels are extremely profitable,” according to Bloomberg. “With our room rates, we operate 50-to-60 percent margins in the hotels. So I want to add more rooms,” he explained. Preliminary data from the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority reportedly shows that in 2017, for the first time in four years, visitors to the city declined 1.7 percent to 42.2 million. In the last three months of the year, declines were reportedly steeper after a mass shooting on Oct. 1 that left 58 people dead. Bloomberg reports that last year in Las Vegas room rates swelled 2.8 percent to an average of $129 a night, while the occupancy rate changed little from a year earlier. The hotel rooms at Wynn West will reportedly feature 80-inch TVs, 24-foot-wide window views and his-and-her bathrooms. Wynn said that the company’s average room rates are on the rise and by the time every room that is under construction is completed, they will like hit $400, according to the Bloomberg report. In Everett, Massachusetts the $2.4 billion Wynn Boston Harbor Resort located along the banks of the Mystic River and described by Wynn Resorts as “America's first five-star urban gaming resort,” will reportedly open its doors in 2019.

Dutch Financial Markets Authority Warns of Cryptocurrency Investment Risks, Bans Gambling-Like Binary Options

The Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM) is calling for restrictive measures on bitcoin and altcoins investment and betting on the price of bitcoin at a time when banking firms warn that a bitcoin bubble could dwarf the 1600s Dutch tulip mania.

In an interview with local media outlet de Volksrant, Merel van Vroonhoven, Chairwoman of the AFM, said that while the Authority does not have the capacity to ban or restrict cryptocurrency investment, it can ban “exotic products”, including binary options. Among other things, these allow customers to bet on the price of bitcoin. Ms. Van Vroonhoven said that such a ban might be imminent, due to growing concerns over the risks products of this nature pose to customers.

Citing a recent study, the financial official said that between 74% and 89% of all customers of binary options platforms are losing money with those products, failing to calculate the risks well in advance.

“Investment products are not a game, and bitcoin is not a game.”

The AFM Chairwoman voiced concerns that the difference between binary options and gambling is thinning, and it might disappear completely to members of the younger generation. She further pointed that customers are usually targeted with techniques that very much resemble the online gambling industry’s approaches.

The AFM has warned cryptocurrency investors and binary options customers on multiple occasions over the years, particularly over the past several months and weeks when fears over an eventual burst of the bitcoin bubble intensified.

Kansspelautoriteit ’s Stance on Cryptocurrency Investment

Following requests and inquiries, the Dutch Gambling Authority clarified its own involvement in cryptocurrency investment regulation last week. In a statement, the regulatory body pointed out that it had no role in the regulation of the activity. Kansspelautoriteit further explained that under the country’s current gambling regulations, investment in bitcoin and other virtual currencies does not represent gambling.

The regulator determined its role in the regulation of cryptocurrency investment, or rather its lack of a role, after comprehensive research of the essence of the activity. Kansspelautoriteit pointed out that it was not before it had looked carefully into virtual currencies and the technology behind them that it was able to determine its participation in regulating an activity which is currently very difficult to regulate not only in the Netherlands but also across the globe.

At the time of writing bitcoin’s price stands at $11,034.88, down from its December all-time high of $19,343.04.

In a research letter to bitcoin investors, banking firm Goldman Sachs joined the pack of analysts and financial institutions warning about the risks of cryptocurrency investment. The bank generally praised the technology that powers bitcoin and altcoins, as it offers easy global execution, lower costs of transactions, traceability of all transactions, and so no. However, it pointed out that bitcoin currently does not provide any of these benefits.

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Genii games for Bede Gaming Limited

Online casino games developer Genii has announced the signing of a deal that will see its full portfolio of 140 high-definition titles made available to remote operators via the platform from fellow British innovator Bede Gaming Limited. London-headquartered Genii stated that the agreement will enable clients of Bede Gaming Limited to enjoy an innovative online games portfolio that ‘incorporates a broad range of genres to cater to players of all types and from any market’ such as its patented Spin16 range. Nick Barr, Sales Director for Genii, which also has offices in Malta and Vietnam, declared that the deal will enable his firm to utilize the online gaming platform from Bede Gaming Limited to ‘deliver innovative and patented content with player engagement and interaction firmly embedded in each game to operators in the gaming market swiftly and easily’. For its part, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne-based Bede Gaming Limited explained that the agreement will assist its ‘industry-leading mobile performance’ as the games from Genii are available to enjoy on ‘all mobile platforms’ including those running the Apple, Android and Windows operating systems as well as via desktop. “This is a great addition to our ever strengthening product,” read a statement from Michael Brady, Chief Executive Officer for Bede Gaming Limited. “Genii will add a new dimension to our offering with its innovative and engaging content while its broad genres ensure there are games to accommodate all player types.”

MassGaming Collaborates with Casino Operators to Develop Responsible Gambling Tools

The Massachusetts Gaming Commission has agreed to collaborate with Las Vegas casino giants MGM Resorts International and Wynn Resorts on devising responsible gambling systems for patrons at the two companies’ casinos in the state.

Said systems will allow casino players to set their own spending budgets and to be automatically alerted when they are nearing their preset limits.

Late last week, Massachusetts gaming commissioners approved unanimously the collaborative approach in developing what are hoped to be effective responsible gambling systems at the two casinos over the establishment of such systems through regulatory procedures, which can oftentimes be quite lengthy.

MGM Resorts is entering the final stages of construction of its $950-plus-million casino resort in the Massachusetts city of Springfield. The hotel and casino complex is slated to open doors in September 2018. MGM Resorts has even begun looking for staff for the property.

Wynn Resorts is developing a $2-billion resort along the Mystic River in Everett, Greater Boston. The property will be launched in the summer of 2019. The two resorts will feature Massachusetts’ first full-scale commercial casinos.

The state Legislature approved the proposed casino expansion back in 2013. Four casino licenses were originally supposed to be issued under the new regulations – one for a slots-only parlor and three for full-fledged casinos.

Three licenses were eventually granted to interested operators. The state’s first commercial slots parlor opened doors in 2015.

Responsible Gambling Systems

As mentioned above, Massachusetts’ gambling regulator together with the operators of the state’s commercial casinos will develop systems that will make it possible for casino frequenters to determine how much they want to spend at the venues.

Once they approach their limits, they will be instantly notified and will be able to decide whether they want to continue playing and exceed their preset spending budgets, or they will keep their gambling spending within the limits. Here it is important to note that the responsible gambling systems will be of a voluntary nature, which means that it will be up to players to determine how to manage their casino-intended funds.

In an interview with local news outlet MassLive, Stephen Crosby, Chairman of the Massachusetts Gaming Commission, said that they will pursue “innovative and aggressive” promotion of responsible gambling and will pay special attention to problem gambling.

Of their non-regulatory approach towards implementing responsible gambling tools across the state’s casino floors, Mr. Crosby said that they considered it quite innovative and that operators were the main force behind it.

The gaming official further noted they believe their collaboration with the two casino companies will make for better evaluation of the two responsible gambling systems for each of the two casinos, for the implementation of adjustments where and when these are needed, and for additional innovative efforts.

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