In December, Nevada became the first state in the nation to adopt online poker regulations and they seemed on the fast track to becoming the first state in the nation to offer legal online poker. However, after recent developments in both Nevada and Illinois, they may fall short of that goal.

On Monday, Nevada’s Gaming Policy Committee met in Las Vegas where they revealed that they would be issuing the first gaming licenses within the next 30 to 60 days. For many, this is the news that they were waiting to hear as license applications have been steadily flowing in and many expected a decision on these licenses well before now.

Furthermore, it was revealed that it may be six to eight months before a site goes live in Nevada. With that timetable, that would mean the earliest we would see live poker in Nevada is December of this year. While many feel that this is good news, there is now a solid chance that Nevada may become the second state to bring an online poker site live.

Earlier this week, an amendment to Illinois House Bill 4148 outlined the framework to allow the Illinois lottery to offer online poker games in addition to lottery services. While this bill has not went through the proper channels as of yet, one must look at the speed with which the lottery went online with services.

After the DOJ opinion in December, it took Illinois less than three months to get their lottery services online. While online poker is not the lottery, should Illinois approve online gaming, all they really would need is a client and the technology to keep non-residents off the site. They do not need to go through a licensing procedure as the site would be held by the lottery, further reducing the lag time between the bill passing and the site going online.

Although estimates have not been provided for such a project, based on past experience, it is entirely feasible for Illinois to go live with online poker within 3 months of passing their bill. In other words, they could be live by September or October and would leapfrog Nevada as the first state to offer legalized online poker.

Granted, the games would be limited to the lottery website and there would not be competition from outside companies. As such, they will make money from the endeavor, but not to the extent that Nevada likely will. With that said, all of Nevada’s hard work to become the frontrunner in the race to legalize online poker could go for naught should Illinois prove as swift in bringing online gaming live as they have with their online lottery services.

In March, the Illinois lottery became the first state in the US to offer intrastate gambling when they began offering lottery services online.  Now it appears that the state is ready to take the next step and offer other forms of gaming online, including online poker.

According to Cardplayer.com, Illinois Senate President John Cullerton outlined the state’s plans in a letter to Governor Pat Quinn.  The plan is to offer online gaming outside of lottery services and proposed the formation of a Division of Internet Gaming that would be a part of the Illinois Lottery.

On Tuesday, an amendment to House Bill 4148 outlined the powers that the DIG would hold which included their ability to choose which internet games would be offered.  Estimates for new revenues produced by the expansion of gaming could be in the hundreds of Millions and Cullerton hyped the expansion as a way for the state to “position itself as a ‘hub’ for multi-state and international iGaming.”

As part of the amendment submitted, the state will keep a “Voluntary Exclusion” list for those wishing to exclude themselves from playing online.  Also, the state will assemble a “Responsible Internet Gaming Advisory Board” that will make recommendations to the Executive Director of the Division of Internet Gaming in regards to developing rules and procedures to help to stop problem gambling.  They may even be granted powers to help enact these procedures.

Considering how quickly the state acted in regards to putting the lottery online, it is expected that this bill will receive swift attention.  There is even a suggestion that the bill may be heard in the Senate Executive Committee this week.  If this passes, Illinois could potentially leapfrog Nevada in being the first to go live with their online gaming in the US.  We will keep you informed on this story as news develops.

The Cambridge Interactive Development Corporation (CIDC) is a major proponent of online gaming legislation. The CIDC is a highly profitable business with a growing presence in Europe. However, as the European market starts to become saturated, the CIDC is looking to capture other markets. CIDC executives yearn for the day when online gaming will be legalized in the United States.

Massachusetts state representative Dan Winslow has been drafting a bill that could potentially legalize online poker in Massachusetts. A spokesman from CIDC told Winslow that the company supports his bill from the moment he started drafting it. In the meantime, CIDC is following developments in gaming legislation in Nevada, California and New Jersey.

Tim Dent, CEO of the Cambridge Interactive Development Corporation, said that online gaming legislation would create a number of new opportunities for state governments. Dent said that legislation would offer protection for consumers, create high-tech jobs and raise revenues for the state.

According to a 2009 study from investment banking firm Goldman Sachs, state governments could raise $90 million annually if they legalized and taxed online gaming. That figure is expected to have grown significantly over the past three years, making Dent’s point even more credible. Additionally, the market for online gaming in the United States is estimated to be worth approximately $12 billion. Gaming firms are likely to continue creating high tech jobs as they try to compete for that market.

Dent told reporters that his firm has developed online gaming software for companies across the world. CIDC’s experience in online gaming markets in other parts of the globe suggests that any legislation would provide many benefits for both the industry and local governments.

Bwin Party has been eagerly trying to get lawmakers to ease some of the laws on online gaming in California and the rest of the country. The firm is aware that one of the biggest challenges has been getting the support of Native American tribes. According to a report from Reuters, Bwin Party has taken a new measure that may help them resolve the discord among the tribes and create some headway with online gaming legislation.

Bwin has signed a 10-year contract with the United Auburn Indian Community, which operates casinos in California. Under the new agreement, Bwin will provide technology to the UAIC to help them coordinate online gaming services.

Jim Ryan, one of the two CEOs of Bwin Party, said that the new agreement will be mutually beneficial to both parties. Ryan acknowledges that Bwin Party will need to forge strong alliances in the event online gaming is legalized in California.

After a number of signs that the United States government may be seriously considering legalizing online gaming, Ryan doesn’t want to ignore the opportunity to take advantage of any opportunity or partnership that can help his firm reach its goal. The partnership with the UAIC is one of the steps Ryan feels Bwin Party needs to take to implement an online gaming platform in California and possibly the rest of the United States.

The UAIC holds a similar opinion. Tribal Chairman David Keyser said that online gaming legislation is inevitable in California. In order to implement an online gaming system, the UAIC is going to need to make sure that it has the support of a developer like Bwin Party that has years of experience.

Yesterday we reported that Lock Poker was to leave the Merge Gaming Network and acquire the Cake Network.  Earlier today, Lock confirmed these reports with a press release confirming the acquisition of the Cake Network.  They also will rebrand the network as the Revolution Gaming network.

The press release is  below:

“As of June 1st a whole new world awaits the Lock Nation.

Lock is in the process of acquiring assets from Cake and will be re-branding the Cake Network to launch Revolution Gaming, driving technology, marketing, player rewards and implementing a richer tournament schedule. The LockPRO team will be at the foundation of these changes. They will come together and offer their recommendations on all levels, truly bringing the player into the boardroom.

To all existing Lock players this move will be seamless – it will take the form of a simple software update happening on May 31st. You will login to find your real money balance as well as everything else you know and love about Lock. Lock will also continue to manage their own stand-alone cashier so withdrawals will be as fast and easy as they are now. All players’ current player VIP rewards will only increase and all rakeback players will be moved over to the increased percentage on Revolution. More details coming soon.

Get ready for the exciting new times ahead as we continue to drive the new era where the player reigns. 

“We are very excited at the prospect of driving the product, marketing and overall vision of the network. It is a dream come true,” says Jennifer Larson, CEO of Lock. “Merge was a great stepping stone for us but we have outgrown them. We really need to forge our own path to continued success. The only way to do this is to stay true to our of core philosophy: partnering with our players.”

LOCK

Lock is the world’s most innovative online gaming brand. Lock launched their first masterpiece, Lock Poker, over four years ago and recently launched their ground breaking Casino. They exploded into poker industry by introducing the Bluff Online Poker challenge, becoming the first company to develop a Mac download casino, introducing SharkScope integration, live stats and a custom hand re-player. Last but certainty not least hiring Eric Rizen Lynch as their Poker Room Manager. Lock continues to bring a fresh perspective to this exciting industry and its mandate is to drive innovation through superior design and initiative. http://www.lockpoker.eu & http://www.lockcasino.eu”

In a story broke earlier this evening by Gambling911, Lock Poker is leaving the Merge Network and will acquire the Cake Network. Lock Poker has been at odds with Merge since the network cancelled the much publicized LockOps tournament series last month.

According to the report, Lock will run as a separate site and both Cake Poker and Intertops Poker will run as separate rooms. In addition, there are plans to rebrand the network and to reintroduce Lock’s rakeback program but at a higher rate than before it was discontinued.

The report was initially taken with a grain of salt considering that Gambling911 is not considered the most reliable news source in poker. However, around 6:30 this evening, an affiliate manager on PokerAffiliateListings.com confirmed that the deal had taken place. According to “imjustshane”, an official press release is indeed coming and that the deal was true.

I’ve done some digging myself regarding this and I can also confirm that a press release is indeed coming shortly from the company. The source said that the release would give the details and clear up any confusion surrounding the matter.

With that said, not everyone is taking the acquisition of Cake as a positive step. Jonathan Aguiar took to twitter and told his followers to “Get your money off @lockpoker immediately!!! Seems they are making moves to get control of player funds and leave merge#warningsigns”

He followed that tweet up with ” Cake is nearly dead to start with and @lockpoker winners won’t be able to last long leaching off their diminished player pool.

Lock is following the death spiral doylesroom took, unable to find a network to host them, too small to survive alone, default comes next”

CalvinAyre.com pointed out that the Cake Network has been having trouble as of late with payments and that “noted industry scammer” Bryce Vincent Geoffrey is part of the legal team for Lock Poker. Geoffrey apparently has a history of alienating B2B clients.

Whether the negativity thrown out in connection with this deal is warranted or not is yet to be seen. For now, the poker world will wait for the official announcement of the deal and see where things head from there. We will have more information on this story once it becomes available.

There has been some interesting developments in regards to Groupe Bernard Tapie and their failed deal with Full Tilt Poker. Earlier today, a story was published on Diamond Flush Poker regarding the failed deal and an email that Bernard Tapie sent to key staff members at Full Tilt Poker.

The email talks at first about why the deal failed. According to Tapie, the DOJ required that they repay the $184 Million owed to players outside the United States within a 90 day period of closing the deal, and they felt this was unreasonable. They also laid out what their plan was that called for most players being paid on the first day and other being spread out over a period of five years.

The most interesting part of the email regards Tapie’s discussion about how Pocket Kings does not have the money to continue to pay salaries past April and it does not appear that anything will be done to guarantee jobs with the company.

From that point, Tapie lies out a plan where he plans to open his own online poker company under the auspices of Gamed Cubed that he created in Ireland. However, in order to do so, he requires that the entire staff of Pocket Kings join him and asks that the decision be made by the end of the week.

His offer is to keep employees at their current salary levels, benefit levels, and seniority levels. From there he plans to have a new platform created that he claims will be the “best of breed in 6-7 months.” He also plans to have Poker Strategy setup an affiliate program for the new company.

If the employees of Pocket Kings accept this deal, they will have to sign a non-disclosure agreement as well as a non-compete and a non-solicitation agreement as part of their employment.

At present, there are no reports on anyone accepting the deal from Tapie, but per the terms of his offer, we should know something about this by the end of the week. We will keep you informed on this story as more information is made available.

According to a recent report in the Wall Street Journal, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Arizona Senator Jon Kyl are working on a bill to legalize online gaming in the United States. This type of “story” has been reported several times in the past and has yet to produce any real fruit.

However, this time seems a little different in the fact that depending on the language of the bill, the bill could undermine attempts by state governments to legalize online poker and sports betting. If this is true, the Senators are playing with political fire. They have apparently forgotten one important point.

States Don’t Like Their Rights Trampled On.

As most of us know, state governments get very testy when it comes to having their rights trampled on by the federal government. Should an online bill put up roadblocks or ever countermand any state legislation, Congress could find themselves in a big legal fight.

For example, can you imagine the firestorm in Utah should federal legislation allow tribal casinos to offer gaming in the state? Nevada already has their own set of regulations in place for online poker and the government could swoop in and run their own show should they desire. Congress could likely be opening a can of worms they can’t close.

Granted, any bill they come up with will likely die quickly as Congress really doesn’t have the votes needed to get such a bill through in an election year. Also, the legal and political repercussions would be too great for some to risk this type of bill.

For now, state legalization of online poker seems to be the only valid course and should federal legislation be drafted, it has to recognize states rights and not supercede them. Doing anything contrary to this will cause more legal and political problems than they are worth.

As reported earlier, the deal between GBT and the DOJ fell through at the last minute and it is reported that PokerStars has now purchased Full Tilt Poker.

GBT released the following statement regarding the matter and claim unreasonable demands by the DOJ along with unresolvable legal issues as their reasons for the deal falling through.

The statement from GBT is as follows:

“Groupe Bernard Tapie regrets to announce that, after seven months of intensive work, our efforts to obtain final approval of the United States Department of Justice of the agreement to acquire the assets of Full Tilt Poker have ended without success.

Ultimately, the deal failed due to two major issues.

The parties could not agree on a plan for repayment of ROW players.

GBT proposed a plan that would have resulted in immediate reinstatement of all ROW player balances, with a right to withdraw those funds over time, based on the size of the player balance and the extent of the player’s playing activity on the re-launched site. All players would have been permitted complete withdrawal of their balances, regardless of whether they played on the site, by a date certain, and 94.9% of ROW players would have been fully repaid on day 1. DOJ ultimately insisted on full repayment with right of withdrawal within 90 days for all players– a surprise demand made in the 11th hour, after months of good-faith negotiations by GBT.

The legal complications surrounding the deal – specifically, questions surrounding the legality of the forfeiture under non-US laws – also proved unresolvable.

All of the key assets of the FTP companies reside outside of the United States. A non-US court well might regard the purported forfeiture as a “fraudulent transaction” and declare it invalid or deem the acquirer of the assets responsible for all of those creditor obligations.

Given the $80 million purchase price, and the substantial amount of cash needed to relaunch FTP, those issues ultimately proved too substantial to overcome.

GBT is very conscious of the hopes it has created – among FTP employees that they will retain their jobs, among FTP players that they will recover their balances, and among the entire poker community that the world’s finest poker platform will be relaunched and bring a needed added element of competition to a world market that today is fully dominated by a single operator.

GBT cannot accept the end of those hopes.

For that reason, unless a concrete and legally viable solution is found in the very coming days to save the employees and repay the players of FTP, we will move to our own plan of action.

We understand from press reports that the DOJ may have entered into an agreement with PokerStars pursuant to which PokerStars will acquire the FTP assets. 
If accurate, we can only assume that PokerStars determined that it was willing to accept these legal and financial risks in order to resolve its own legal situation with DOJ.

 If a PokerStars acquisition of FTP means that all FTP players will be fully repaid immediately, we are very happy for the players, as their final and full repayment has always been our priority.

We only regret that such a deal would signal further consolidation of a poker market already dominated by a single player – an outcome that may raise antitrust concerns and that, in the long run, is probably not good for players and for the whole online poker industry.”

With the statement given, one has to wonder why GBT took the steps they have recently in connection with the deal, including incorporating a new company and posting help wanted add for the ”New Full Tilt.” Hopefully some of those questions will be answered in upcoming days.

Recent signs have recently pointed to the deal between Groupe Bernard Tapie and Full Tilt Poker being close to finalized. However, in a stunning turn of events, it now appears that not only has the deal between the two failed, but now PokerStars has pulled off the online coupe of the century and purchased Full Tilt Poker.

Rumors began to swirl on 2+2 forums earlier this morning that PokerStars had swooped in and purchased the company instead of GBT. PokerFuse.com later reported that according to their sources, PokerStars has settled with the United States Department of Justice and that the settlement included the purchase of Full Tilt Poker.

According to the rumored agreement, PokerStars will pay $750 Million for the company and $330 Million of that money will go to repay players worldwide. CEO of Chili Gaming Alex Dreyfus reported on the deal on Twitter earlier this morning.

In regards to the long awaited deal between GBT and Full Tilt Poker, the company released a statement on Tuesday saying that “unresolvable” legal issues as well as an inability to settle on a repayment play led to the downfall of the deal.

Requests for comment from the DOJ and PokerStars have not been answered or have been given a “no comment” at the moment. If the deal is indeed sealed, there should be more reported on the deal very shortly.

Stay tuned as we will bring you more on this story as it develops.