Weekly Roundup July 5 2013
All of this week’s regulated poker news came out of New Jersey. PokerStars lost its second court challenge related to its failed bid to acquire the Atlantic Club casino in Atlantic City. A judge ruled that Atlantic Club may sell to another buyer as PokerStars missed its deadline to purchase the casino in April.
Four Atlantic City Casinos Announce Partners
PokerStars and its parent company Rational Group already had a backup plan in the works. The world’s largest online poker company had been negotiating with Resorts International and the two companies agreed to join forces in the New Jersey online gambling industry. PokerStars must still receive approval from the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement. This may prove to be a tough task with the American Gaming Association opposing it and the Black Friday indictment from 2011 that was settled for $731 million. PokerStars is also a defendant in a lawsuit in Kentucky where the State is trying to recover its player losses as allowed under state loss recovery laws.
Trump Taj Mahal announced that it would partner with Ultimate Gaming, which is the parent company of Ultimate Poker. Ultimate Gaming is the first company to launch a regulated online poker room in the United States. In addition to poker, Ultimate Gaming also owns a casino platform that will be used in New Jersey.
Trump Plaza chose a different online gambling partner than its sister property. Trump Plaza will go with Betfair, which is already licensed in New Jersey through its online horseracing company TVG. Betfair has been troubled since it went public in 2010. This includes a major promotion that it refused to honor known as Happy Hour.
The other New Jersey partnership announced this week was between Tropicana and Gamesys, which is a company known for its real money Facebook applications in the United Kingdom. Gamesys hopes to use its social media skills to convert Tropicana players into real money online gamblers.
Caesars Entertainment will partner with 888, Borgata with bwin.party and Golden Nugget with Bally Technologies. These three partnerships were already known before this week.
Atlantic Club and Revel have yet to announce their online gambling partners.