The fallout from Friday’s indictment of the top three online poker room owners who accepted American players continues this week, as the industry’s poker rooms are examining new landscapes, evaluating their own policies on American players and vying for new players’ positions.
The two companies named in the indictment, PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker, have closed their U.S. operations. A third company, Absolute Poker, has allowed U.S. players with existing balances to play actual money games as of yesterday afternoon, but has not allowed new U.S. players to sign up or deposit or withdraw existing players.
Victory Poker CEO Dan Fleishman, who is not named in the indictment, announced that his site will voluntarily leave the U.S. market and all American players on the site will move to Cake Poker. Fleishman said that one-third of Victory’s players are Americans.
“[Cake] has already shut off the American players (in Victory Poker) and is now running the switch,” Fleishman said in an email. “[Cake Poker] will continue to network the American players for as long as they want, but I made a personal choice not to let Victory continue.”
Fleyshman is one of a handful of online poker executives who are identifiable in the industry. Since launching his site in February 2010, he has actively promoted his brand through online videos, advertisements, and professional player sponsorship. Despite recent actions against online poker site owners, Fleyshman said he is not concerned that he may be a target of law enforcement officials.
“I don’t have an XYZ shell company or shady processing,” Fleishman said, referring to the alleged bank fraud and money laundering facing the big three online poker rooms. “Seungri is a poker skin on the network, so we don’t have access to merchant accounts, credit card processing, wire transfers, etc.” When I heard for the second time that the government was toppling the top three, I stopped the American players for the victory, even though none of the other skins of Cake, Mersey, Everleaf, and Yahatei (network) did. It’s a personal choice. I don’t want to fight the government. They are tenacious and almighty.” 안전놀이터
Fleyshman has been in talks with the CERUS network about a possible move to join the third-largest network that allows U.S. players, but is expected to halt those talks and now join Cake.