No more Pokershare for Americans

[Clownfish]

We would like to thank you for being a member of PokerShare. We are writing to inform you that due to a policy change as of November 1, 2005 North American residents are no longer able to play in the PokerShare cardroom.

We have closed your account. If you had a cash balance in your account we have initiated a withdrawal for you to refund these monies in full. Along with your cash balance we have converted any Tournament Entry Chips (TECs) and included them in the withdrawal of funds.

If you are owed money, you will be receiving a check in full for your entire account balance to your address on file. Balances in excess of $500 have been sent by FedEx. Smaller balances have been sent by regular mail.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

Sincerely

Robert
pokershareinquiries@ecom-arts.com

[XxGodJrxX]

There goes my 33% rakeback and $200 bonus that I have not cleared.

So there goes my trust for UB. My thoughts are that the pokershare business model caused major concenrs that they were violating US securities laws (US owners owning an equity stake in a non us company that is not registered with the SEC as a foregin issuer = not legal lol). The problem witht his thought is that sharepoints were not true equity stakes. There were no voting rights or management rights associated with the "shares" which is the most fundamental right associated with equity ownership. The "dividends" were not really dividends, but rather they were a form of profit sharing. I'm not about to get all nerdy and analyze whether these paymetns are legal under US securities laws, but my guess is that the SEC thinks not. I wonder if I'll receive my somewhat substantial dividend for my play in the last quarter. I hope so, but an not very optimistic.

On a side note, what is the best site to play at ( one that a reputable source offers rakeback on obviously) that has a lot of players registered? Any thoughts?

Ryan

[BillFranklin]

[ QUOTE ]
On a side note, what is the best site to play at ( one that a reputable source offers rakeback on obviously) that has a lot of players registered? Any thoughts?


[/ QUOTE ]

Even before this happened i was looking for another site with out much luck. It seems if you play tournaments or NL ring games you should find a bunch of sites but if you play Limit like me it seems you kinda screwed. There are very few sites with alot of players registered that offer good limit games above .5/1. (please someone correct me if i'm wrong)

the SEC thing makes no sense. first, poker sites are not concerned with US laws (ie statements made by party poker before thier ipo). second, the email stated North Americans, not Americans. if it was a US law thing, it wouldn't be for all of North America. try to remember that people outside the USA are not subject to american laws.

Although Dan Druff what are almost certainly the real reasons behind this affair, there appears to be some confusion amongst US residents and non-US residents alike about the matter of whether any US laws might have been broken by UK company Playit Ownit Ltd, or by Canadian company Excapsa.

Although it would be nice to think that non-US companies are not governed by US laws, I fear that this is not the case. The recent Executive Life scandal in California not only had a French bank fined under US law, it also had a French bank caught between California law and US Federal law, which appeared to disagree with each other.


In this case I think that Sarbanes-Oxley might be a more relevant act to assess than the 1933 act -- partiularly section 906 of Sarbanes Oxley, which states that:

"each periodic report filed under Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Exchange Act containing financial statements (e.g., any Form 10‑Q or Form 10‑K) filed by a domestic or foreign issuer be accompanied by a written statement of the CEO and CFO."

Without going into the horrific complexities that tend to accompany any attempt to offer non-US equity, or corporate bonds, or securitizations to US investors (it's no coincidence that many non-US financial web sites now try to stop US residents from accessing their pages or, if they do allow access, point out that the details contained therein are not intended for US consumption), suffice it to say that non-US companies are very careful when it comes to offering anything inside the US, mainly because it is a far more regulated country than most European countries and certainly far more regulated than any emerging economy.


Part of the reason that the US is not particularly concerned about this is that, in economic terms, it is far more isolated than most European countries. In the US a vast majority of GDP is generated internally, and what foreign trade there is is mainly with Canada and Mexico. This is one of the reasons that people in the US worry less about what looks to overseas eyes to be a stonkingly unsustainable trade deficit, solely financed by printing more dollar bills and T-Bonds, which are eagerly snapped up in China and elsewhere.

The emergence of online poker has, to an extent, put US online poker players in a far more "international" position than most of their peers. For many, this is an unusual experience. I have met many (senior) people in US companies who, for example, had no idea that paper sizes were different in Europe. Knowledge of how financial systems work overseas (e.g., mortgage, banking and insurance regulations) tends to be narrow, even within financial operations. This is fair enough, since for most Americans overseas financial regulation would never affect them.

In the case of online poker, it is now becoming necessary to understand overseas financial law because a number of US companies (and online poker players such as yourselves) are becoming involved.

A couple of brief and salient points.

1) Forget about phoning average Joe class-action Lawyer if an affiliate stitches you up. International law is expensive and if you lose jurisdiction (i.e., if your lawyer fails to get the case heard in an ideal place like Florida or Texas, but has to fly over to London or Tel Aviv), you will find that jury awards are considerably more parsimonious. For this reason, Joe class-action Lawyer is unlikely to want to have anything to do with an international case.

2) Foreign companies, if they are unlikely to need to worry about operating in the US in the future, are pretty much invulnerable. The only effect might be the "Polanksi Syndrome", meaning that it might be dangerous for an offending senior executive to land in the US. So, if a foreign-registered company (which all onine poker companies are) takes your $30K deposit, there is (legally) unlikely to be much that you can do.

Pete

[scrapperdog]

[ QUOTE ]
(US owners owning an equity stake in a non us company that is not registered with the SEC as a foregin issuer = not legal lol).

Ryan

[/ QUOTE ]

What exactly are your qualifications for making this statement? I know you are a trusted poster with your 3 posts but I would like to know exactly how you know this.
scrapperdog

In response to the comment about my lack of posting, I am more of a lurker, I prefer to read, but in this instance, I felt I could lend osme knowledge to the situation to anyone who may be wondering what the heck is going on.

R

[wonderwes]

[ QUOTE ]

On a side note, what is the best site to play at ( one that a reputable source offers rakeback on obviously) that has a lot of players registered? Any thoughts?

Ryan

[/ QUOTE ]

You'll probably find the best of everything including customer service at Pokerstars.

[Exsubmariner]

Your statement about the SEC is patently BS. The real reason is that this site was created specifically to grab rakeback customers from Party. Now that Party has started Armegeddon on it's own affiliates and skins, the market isn't there to grab any more. Why should UB bleed money off to savy internet players via pokershare when they could force them to play on UB? Any "it might be illegal" statements from Pokershare are pure cover. They saw an opportunity to poach their own skin and they took it. Simple.

Scum bags.

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