In northern Nevada, six casinos operated by the Holder Hospitality Group have officially filed for bankruptcy as creditors try to force receivership on the six casinos. Harold Holder purchased the casinos over the last ten years.

Some of the casinos involved are the Commercial Casino and Stockmen’s Casino, both in Elko, Scoreboard Casino in Spring Creek, Parker’s Model T in Winnemucca, and the El Capitan in Hawthorne. The sixth, which already closed down is the Silver Club in Sparks. Last week a receivership hearing began, after a creditor had a $33 million note in default. Holder executives still have hope that they can avoid loss of control of the casino gambling company. They also believe they can organise debt so that the casinos can crawl back up from bankruptcy healthy. Holder’s personal ideas seems to indicate the elderly gambling operator expects to bounce back. “Being broke is a temporary situation. If you take a guy on a street corner, and one guy is poor and the other guy is broke, the broke guy is going to be the one who will be looking to make money,” Holder said when he started out in the casino business.

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Russia’s new law which bans all gambling in Russia and places it in 4 designated areas, will be implemented on July 1st. With the deadline looming on the horizon, casino operators are saying the zones will never work.

Casino operators in Russia say that the four gambling zones will never work in the way they are planned. They blame the lack of infrastructure and hesitancy of casino gambling operators to move so far from the city’s. Some of the operators say nothing has been built or accomplished in the four gambling zones, despite the fact there is a deadline for July 1st for all casinos and gambling halls to close and move to the designated zones. The zones are located in Siberia, the pacific coastline, the black sea and in southern Russia. “Nobody feels like moving there, besides there is no infrastructure in those special zones, and nothing has been built there yet.” said a spokesperson. The gambling industry fears the black market casinos will thrive, because taxing legal casino earns Moscow about 200 million in gambling revenue, which now either leaves abroad or disappears in the organised crime.

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Antigua and Barbuda was the first online gambling licensing jurisdiction in the world, and still is one of the most reputed jurisdictions. Recently Antigua and Barbuda made the White List of the United Kingdom regulators. The Directorate of Offshore Gaming in Antigua function under the Financial Services Regulatory Commission. The head of this commission, Leroy King, is suspended because he is linked to the shady financier Allen Stanford and his failed pyramid scheme.

Internet gambling operator paradise Antigua and Barbuda has challenged the United States over the implementation of the anti gambling law UIGEA and its fatal effect on the online gambling operators in Antigua. Antigua had won disputes with the WTO, which the US was refusing to respect. It was then that accusations against King by the United States first surfaced. Leroy King was accused of accepting bribes to ignore abnormality’s in Allen Stanford’s banking operations based in Antigua and Barbuda. The accusations specifically stated that King ran dummy audits of Stanford’s bank so that the irregularities did not come to light. This news has now endangered the reputation of Antigua an Barbuda as a licensing authority for online casino gambling. Attorney General of Antigua, Justin Simon acknowledged this and said, “Antigua and Barbuda’s offshore business activities once again placed under intense international scrutiny, and this will clearly have adverse effects on the economy and raise questions about our regulatory legal framework.” He also said that an extensive internal investigation is being conducted into King’s activities. The Cabinet of Antigua will decide which action to take against King.

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In almost every state you can find wireless internet on public transport and public spaces, the state of Utah takes it one step further, they will now have police on the bus to check if no one uses the wireless internet to access online gambling sites.

If any passenger gets caught using the wireless internet to access online casino gambling sites, pornographic sites or other sites regarded as inappropriate, can now be fined by the Utah Transit Authority. The authority already uses filter software in order to block any unwanted content. The police will now be allowed to fine a passenger up to 300 dollar for accessing a site which worked around the filter. Gerry Carpenter, spokesperson for UTA said: “The filter is dynamic and constantly updated by the software provider to provide the most up-to-date protection possible. But some gambling sites may escape the net, and passengers violating the terms of service for the free Wi-Fi can now be fined 300 dollar for a single violation.” Even if a person views a previously downloaded online casino site he or she can be charged with a 100 dollar fine. Libertarians claim the new rule is violating free speech, and merely visiting an online gambling site is not against the law.

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CryptoLogic Ltd announced today it has signed a multi-year contract to provide Irish bookmaker Paddy Power Games with at least 9 of their most popular online slotmachines.

The terms of the deal with the popular provider of betting and gambling services in Britain, Paddy Power were not disclosed. CryptoLogic, a developer of branded gambling and internet casino software, said two of their products are already launched on the Paddy Power Games platform with the rest of the online casino games ready before the end of 2009. CryptoLogic, which has a database with more than 280 games, announced that the online slotmachine would be available through the Orbis Technology’s Fixed Odds Games platform. CryptoLogic and Orbis closed a deal in December 2008 as part of their expansion strategy for its channels to the internet gambling market.

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Cryptologic one of the world’s leading online casino software developers, announced that they signed a multi-year contract to provide at least 10 of its most exciting and most popular online slot machines to Sportingbet.com, which is a large online gambling company.

The first casino games both branded and non-branded will be available by the end of this year on Sportingbet, and the full 10 games will all be playable this year. The games will be provided through the Gaming Technology Solutions plc (GTS) portal, which is a platform for many leading internet gambling sites. Brian Hadfield, Cryptologics CEO said: “CryptoLogic’s steady stream of signings of the world’s largest online gambling brands is part of the continued execution of the business strategy we announced late last year, With Sportingbet.com on our customer list alongside PartyGaming, 888.com and Betfair, CryptoLogic is very proud to have the confidence of the “big four” international online casino operators. This will mean a superior experience for players, enhanced revenue for our customers and profitability for CryptoLogic shareholders.”

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The 33 million of Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker player funds which has been frozen by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) for the Southern District of New York may actually be good news for online casino providers like PartyGaming, Playtech and 888. This is according to the Deutsche Bank.

Garth Kimber, head of egaming at the Isle of man said: “The Gambling Supervision Commission of the Isle of Man is aware of the situation and is looking into it.” It is not clear if the move by the US DoJ is a signal for a tougher crackdown on poker sites still taking US bets 3 years after the UIGEA. The Deutsche Bank says high-rollers not from the US, will move away from the likes of Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker, in fear of losing their funds and bankroll. Even though the sum of 33 million dollars is not material and the sites are thougth to have higher player deposits than PartyPoker, the trust of the player is most important, there is no need to freeze all player funds to have an impact on confidence and liquidity. Even if the action by the DoJ would not lead to a total crackdown, anything that changes players confidence in the US-facing sites, is a positive sign for the other listed online casino and online poker operators. Shares of both PartyGaming and 888 went up, during the time of the news.

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In an interview with KNPR, Barney Frank told interviewers he believes the personal freedom represented by online gambling outweighs the unsupported claims that children need protection from the Internet. Barney Frank explained why he thinks his internet gambling bill in important in an interview with Nevada Public Radio last week.

Once again Barney Frank said allowing online gambling is a matter of personal freedom, the gamblers hero crushed the opponents arguments. Frank says that Internet gambling is a choice, and shouldn’t be restricted by the government without a decent cause. When asked about opponents claims from the likes of Spencer Bachus and others, that online casino gambling puts children at risk, Barney Frank swiftly defended his bill. Frank said: “It is insensible to say the only danger on the Internet is gambling.” Frank noticed that a lot of online products are being protected by age restrictions. “Age restriction happens all the time, it’s nothing new.” said Frank. He said the US utilizes such restrictions for cigarettes, alcohol, and certain sexual material, and gambling at online casinos is no should be no different. While gambling addiction is a danger, it should be treated, just as addiction to video gaming needs treatment, Frank said. He pointed out that no one wants to ban video games, despite addictive behaviour is often found among young gamers. Frank said: “The bottom line is that in most cases, government ought to mind its own business.”

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A research by search engine optimisation (SEO) marketing company Greenlight shows that 888 is the highest profile casino website with UK web users, a ranking of the casino brands best optimised for search engines reveals.

The research by SEO shows that 888 was visible on the first page of results by 63 percent of people entering internet casino related keywords in google UK in April, the last available reliable statistics. Google accounts for 90 percent of the web searches made every year.  888 also was on top of the list of poker sites, sharing the first place with leading PartyPoker.com, but 888 comes in eight when it comes to bingo. Spin Palace is the second most visible online casino site, with 54 percent of the casino related searches coming on the first page. The third most visible site is movie site imdb.com which is the only site next to the top two which turns up on the first page in more than half of the casino searches. A spokes person explained it’s because of the popularity of Matin Scorsese film Casino. After imdb came Intercasino.co.uk with 43 percent and casino.com with 42 percent.

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In a time that online gambling is at its peak, a father and his son came up with the idea to reach some investors about starting their own poker site. The site called LetsPoker.com was supposed to be the type of operation that would have made all involved very wealthy.

But it turned out differently for the site, which did not make it, costing thirteen investors lost more than 180.000 pounds, the father and son have now been charged with security fraud for neglecting to inform investors of the dangers of the internet gambling site. Martin Graham Tyson Sr. and his son, Marting Jr. were indicted on the charges last month, they were leaders of the Texas-based Panorama Global Realty Group. During the investment, investors were not informed about an ongoing fraud case against the father and son company. The state securities board said: “You’ve got to disclose what you’re doing with the money and then follow through with it, otherwise, it’s a criminal offensive.” Prosecutors also claim the two man knew about pending legislation that would make online gambling illegal in the US. They have both been released on bail. If they get convicted for their crimes, they will probably go to jail for the rest of their lives. Online casinos and gambling are incredible popular, and a lot of businesses try to make revenue in the industry.

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