Monthly Archives: December 2016

Week 18 EPL review: Wins for Liverpool & Spurs

Week 18 of the English Premier League is finally done and dusted after Liverpool and Spurs hammer Stoke & Southampton respectively.

Football fans should be giving Liverpool some festive cheer for keeping this Premier League race open. Chelsea is a juggernaut at the moment, but Liverpool is still in the rearview mirror after thumping Stoke 4-1.

The gap is only six points, and with Liverpool scoring 86 goals in 2016, they can be real title contenders if they stop conceding sloppy goals and sort out their goalkeeping situation.

Once again, Jurgen Klopp preferred Simone Mignolet to Loris Karius between the Liverpool sticks, and he should have prevented Jon Walters opening the scoring in the 12th minute.

Okada Manila kicks off casino operations on Dec 30

Newly-opened Philippine integrated resort Okada Manila planning to close the year with the official launch of its casino operations on December 30.

The announcement comes after the $2.4-billion casino resort secured a notice to commence casino operations from state gambling regulator, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR), last December 21.

Under the terms of the deal with PAGCOR, Okada Manila’s casino operations will start under a provisional license. A permanent license is expected to be granted at a later stage.

Okada Manila, developed by Philippines-based Tiger Resort, Leisure and Entertainment Inc., opened its doors to the public last December 21—an event referred to by the venue’s promoter as a “preview period.” The official opening for the resort, which sits on a 44-hectare property, will take place at the end of February 2017, Tiger Resorts said in a statement.

IRS refuses to yield in Coinbase case, fires back at bitcoin customer

No dice for you Coinbase customer.

That was the firm answer given by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in connection with the motion filed by a bitcoin user who sought to block the tax agency from issuing a “John Doe” summons on the bitcoin wallet service, Forbes reported.

Several weeks ago, Los Angeles-based lawyer Jeffrey Berns went to court to dispute the legitimacy of IRS effort to obtain the identity and full transaction history of Coinbase customers who bought virtual currency from the company between 2013 and 2015.

Berns, a customer of the bitcoin wallet service, wants the court to either quash its previous approval or put in place a protective order to stop the IRS in its tracks. In his filing, Berns argued that the John Doe summons “would constitute an abuse of process,” describing the tax agency’s request to obtain the user records as “overboard.”

Top ten Holland in 2016

This is a guest contribution by Willem van Oort is the founder of Gaming in Holland. If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you. 

2016 is looking to go down in the history books as a pivotal year for gaming in the Netherlands.

Among this year’s highlights are the adoption of the remote gaming bill by the Lower House, the first granting of a charity lottery license to a new market entrant in nearly thirty years, and the proposal of legislation to privatize state-owned Holland Casino.

Please join us in remembering 2016 through our ten most-read articles of the year!

Top ten Holland in 2016

This is a guest contribution by Willem van Oort is the founder of Gaming in Holland. If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you. 

2016 is looking to go down in the history books as a pivotal year for gaming in the Netherlands.

Among this year’s highlights are the adoption of the remote gaming bill by the Lower House, the first granting of a charity lottery license to a new market entrant in nearly thirty years, and the proposal of legislation to privatize state-owned Holland Casino.

Please join us in remembering 2016 through our ten most-read articles of the year!

Top ten Holland in 2016

This is a guest contribution by Willem van Oort is the founder of Gaming in Holland. If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you. 

2016 is looking to go down in the history books as a pivotal year for gaming in the Netherlands.

Among this year’s highlights are the adoption of the remote gaming bill by the Lower House, the first granting of a charity lottery license to a new market entrant in nearly thirty years, and the proposal of legislation to privatize state-owned Holland Casino.

Please join us in remembering 2016 through our ten most-read articles of the year!

Top ten Holland in 2016

This is a guest contribution by Willem van Oort is the founder of Gaming in Holland. If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you. 

2016 is looking to go down in the history books as a pivotal year for gaming in the Netherlands.

Among this year’s highlights are the adoption of the remote gaming bill by the Lower House, the first granting of a charity lottery license to a new market entrant in nearly thirty years, and the proposal of legislation to privatize state-owned Holland Casino.

Please join us in remembering 2016 through our ten most-read articles of the year!

Top ten Holland in 2016

This is a guest contribution by Willem van Oort is the founder of Gaming in Holland. If you would like to submit a contribution please contact Bill Beatty for submission details. Thank you. 

2016 is looking to go down in the history books as a pivotal year for gaming in the Netherlands.

Among this year’s highlights are the adoption of the remote gaming bill by the Lower House, the first granting of a charity lottery license to a new market entrant in nearly thirty years, and the proposal of legislation to privatize state-owned Holland Casino.

Please join us in remembering 2016 through our ten most-read articles of the year!

Inaugural Pokerstars championship kicks off in the Bahamas next week

Record number of Spin & Go qualifiers turn $10 into PokerStars Main Event package

ONCHAN, Isle of Man – December 2016 – After 13 unforgettable years of sun, sand, and seven-figure prizes, the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure will evolve into something even bigger and become part of the PokerStars Championship, set to be the world’s biggest and richest global poker tour. Thousands of players will make their way from across the world to the sun-drenched Atlantis Resort in Nassau for the 2017 nine-day Bahamas poker extravaganza, which will run from January 6 until January 14 and features an action-packed schedule of tournaments, cash games and activities, sponsored by PokerStars, an Amaya Inc. (Nasdaq: AYA; TSX: AYA) brand.

The $5,000 PokerStars Championship Bahamas Main Event field will include more than 259 online qualifiers, including a record 135 players who managed to turn just $10 into a $10,565 prize package by playing fastpaced special edition Spin & Go tournaments on PokerStars. A wide range of satellites and qualifiers have been running daily on PokerStars giving players a variety of ways to win their seats into the Main Event. The last Bahamas satellite will take place at 14:30 ET tomorrow with one package guaranteed.

The 2017 Bahamas stop is even more significant this year as it marks the first ever PokerStars Championship. The PokerStars Championship Bahamas will be one of the most prestigious events on the poker calendar and will bring a world class poker experience to the Bahamas for poker enthusiasts and pros alike. Among wellknown players and celebrities set to compete for the first PokerStars Championship title are professional golfer Sergio Garcia and Team PokerStars Pros Daniel Negreanu, who is the highest-earning live tournament player of all time with more than $32 million in winnings, Jason Somerville, Vanessa Selbst, Andre Akkari, Jason Mercier, Liv Boeree, Fatima Moreira De Melo, Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier, Chris Moneymaker, Celina Lin, Barry Greenstein, Victor Ramdin, Jake Cody and Felipe ‘Mojave’ Ramos.

Macau’s future bright in 2017: Morgan Stanley

New casino openings and better infrastructure in Macau is driving investment bank Morgan Stanley’s optimism on the former Portuguese enclave’s future.

The South China Morning Post reported that the brokerage firm has raised its for Macau Gross gaming revenue (GGR) growth in 2017 to 10 percent in 2017 from its previous estimate of 2 percent.

In its recent note, Morgan Stanley equity analysts Praveen Choudhary and Alex Poon pointed out that the opening of Wynn Palace and Sands China is expected to continue driving revenue growth and ebitda in the first half of 2017.

“We believe the Macau cycle has turned and 2017 could show 10 per cent GGR and 13 per cent ebitda growth, the first in four years,” the Morgan Stanley analysts said. “And we see both mass and VIP growth tracking better than expected.”

Macau’s future bright in 2017: Morgan Stanley

New casino openings and better infrastructure in Macau is driving investment bank Morgan Stanley’s optimism on the former Portuguese enclave’s future.

The South China Morning Post reported that the brokerage firm has raised its for Macau Gross gaming revenue (GGR) growth in 2017 to 10 percent in 2017 from its previous estimate of 2 percent.

In its recent note, Morgan Stanley equity analysts Praveen Choudhary and Alex Poon pointed out that the opening of Wynn Palace and Sands China is expected to continue driving revenue growth and ebitda in the first half of 2017.

“We believe the Macau cycle has turned and 2017 could show 10 per cent GGR and 13 per cent ebitda growth, the first in four years,” the Morgan Stanley analysts said. “And we see both mass and VIP growth tracking better than expected.”

Macau’s future bright in 2017: Morgan Stanley

New casino openings and better infrastructure in Macau is driving investment bank Morgan Stanley’s optimism on the former Portuguese enclave’s future.

The South China Morning Post reported that the brokerage firm has raised its for Macau Gross gaming revenue (GGR) growth in 2017 to 10 percent in 2017 from its previous estimate of 2 percent.

In its recent note, Morgan Stanley equity analysts Praveen Choudhary and Alex Poon pointed out that the opening of Wynn Palace and Sands China is expected to continue driving revenue growth and ebitda in the first half of 2017.

“We believe the Macau cycle has turned and 2017 could show 10 per cent GGR and 13 per cent ebitda growth, the first in four years,” the Morgan Stanley analysts said. “And we see both mass and VIP growth tracking better than expected.”

D&B Publishing to launch Qui Nguyen autobiography in time for 2017 November nine

D&B Publishing will publish an autobiography of the World Series of Poker Main Event Champion, Qui Nguyen, in time for the 2017 November Nine.

Daniel Negreanu called him ‘the closest thing we have had to Chris Moneymaker,’ and D&B Publishing has got the scoop.

The World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event champion, Qui Nguyen, has agreed to tell his story, and the D&B Publishing team will help him do that. Titled from Vietnam to Vegas! How I won the World Series of Poker Main Event, Nguyen will tell his life story as well as dissecting over 100 key hands from the final table. Steve Blay will co-author.

The WSOP Main Event needed Nguyen after the disaster of the year before. His high-octane style a stark contrast to the slow and laborious bore fest that put most of us to sleep as Joe McKeehen took a stroll in the park.