Massachusetts first gambling venue made close to $20 million in gross gambling revenue in its first full month in business.

The Massachusetts Gaming Commission reported through its website that Plainridge Park Casino raked in $18,155,783.86 GGR, which amounts to $8.9 million for the state.

“It is anticipated that Plainridge Park Casino will generate approximately $200 million of gross gaming revenue in the first full year of operations, which would translate to approximately $98 million in revenues to the Commonwealth,” the state commission said.

Plainridge Park Casino, operated by Penn National Gaming, opened to the public last June 24. The $250-million casino is an integrated racing and gaming facility that includes live harness-racing track in Plainville, Massachusetts. Its gaming area features 1,250 of slot machines, video poker, and video blackjack, among others, but it doesn’t have table games.

eSports betting has been identified as an area of explosive growth for the online gambling industry.  The 24/7 action and numbers surrounding participation, viewership, tournament prize pools and the industry in general are impressive and growing, attracting the attention of bookmakers and therefore iGaming affiliates.

The eSports industry is new to most of us working in iGaming and while it’s a clear area of interest, we’re still deciding if its worth pursuing.  In this week’s column we’ll focus on the opportunity in eSports betting for affiliates, beginning with the growth of the market in general.

The growth of eSports

The eSports market is growing globally and at an incredibly rapid pace.  eSports-betting.pro is one of the top affiliate sites dedicated to the eSports betting market, managed by a team of eSports enthusiasts.  Florian K. is the co-founder of eSports-betting.pro and believes the continued growth of eSports hinges on the publishers of the games establishing more permanent leagues and professional environments for pro-players, but confirmed the future is looking bright.

City of Dreams Manila is banking on gaming revenues from the VIP segment to end the year strong.

The Philippine Star quoted Belle Corp. Vice Chair Willy Ocier, who said, “the second half of 2015 will be strong. COD just started VIP operations in July 2015.”

VIP junket operators act as facilitators for casinos, especially in Macau where they guarantee a substantial amount of revenue from China’s high stakes gambler. But the recent crackdown of the Chinese government has affected many VIP gaming lounges in the city state, prompting operators to look elsewhere for profits.

In fact, the SunCity Group had already announced its plans to open four more VIP rooms in the Philippines, particularly at Bloomberry Resort’s Solaire Resort & Casino and the City of Dreams Manila.

Samuel Taylor Wins the World Series of Poker Circuit Main Event in Foxwoods after beating Joseph Johanssy in heads up action. 

The first festival of the 2015/16 World Series of Poker Circuit has come to a close in Foxwoods Resort Casino, Mashantucket.

[Image Credit: PokerNews]

There were 12-gold ring events and college student Samuel Taylor won the $1,675 Main Event after beating Johanssy Joseph in heads-up action to take the first prize of $149,020.

Former FIFA honorary Vice President Dr. Chung Mong-joon has announced that he will run for the FIFA presidency with an aim to reform the troubled organization in the wake of Sepp Blatter‘s resignation in June.

“The real reason FIFA has become such a corrupt organization is because the same person and his cronies have been running it for years. Absolute power corrupts absolutely,” said Chung in a news conference in Paris on Monday. “It has pained me to witness the spectacle of the FIFA president being booed by the fans at football stadiums everywhere.”

Chung described Blatter as “like a cannibal eating his parents and then crying like he’s an orphan” for trying to avoid responsibility for the crisis that has engulfed FIFA over the last few months. He also criticized the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for endorsing UEFA president Michel Platini, the current favorite to win the election. Chung believes Platini isn’t the right person to usher in a new era of football.

FIFA’s Ethics Committee is now investigating Chung for the $500,000 charitable donations he sent to Haiti and $400,000 to Pakistan the same year. Chung brushed off the investigation as “cynical and unethical” and said he’d been donating money to causes at home and abroad since the 1990s.

Omar Zazay, Jason Mercier, Fabrizio Gonzalez and David Eldridge were the last men standing after the Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open, and Poker Night in America, live streamed four major final tables, simultaneously.

A quartet of smiling faces brought the 2015 Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open to a climactic closure on Tuesday. The tournament organizers, in conjunction with Poker Night in America, took the unprecedented step of simultaneously live streaming four major final tables, and Omar Zazay, Jason Mercier, Fabrizio Gonzalez and David Eldridge walked away with the titles.

The biggest one of the lot went the way of Omar Zazay, who was victorious in the $5m Guaranteed $5,250 buy-in event. 907 players entered, producing an overlay of $601,050, and Zazay defeated local dealer Brian Phillis in heads-up action to capture the $1m first prize. Dan Colman made another impressive run, finishing third, a year after winning the title and $1.4m first prize.

“I was focused on winning and I kept my eyes on the prize,” Zazay told sideline reporter Tatjana Pasalic after his win.

Three-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner, Brian Hastings, has shrugged off his recent online poker problems to join Multi Action Poker as a spokesperson for the company.

As far as sponsorship deals are concerned one would have thought Brian Hastings alleged NoelHayes shenanigans would have proven cataclysmic, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

The three-time World Series of Poker bracelet winner is the latest professional poker player to become affiliated with Multi-Action Poker (MAP). A new form of poker that was unveiled at the Isle of Capri Casino in Pompano Beach Florida in May.

“Multi Action Poker is a fun new variant of live poker,” said Hastings. “The action is fast and furious and players get significantly more hands per hour. MAP is an online poker player’s live poker dream game.”

Australian betting and lottery operator Tatts Group saw profit rise 13% in its most recent fiscal year thanks in part to “great traction” at its online betting operations.

Revenue and earnings were each up a mere 1.8% to A$2.9b (US $1.6b) and A$507.4m respectively in the 12 months ending June 30, but profit from continuing operations rose 13% to A$255.6m. The gains came despite the “heavy lifting” associated with the April 30 rebrand of Tatts’ retail and online wagering business as UBET.

Tatts CEO Robbie Cooke said the initial response to the UBET brand had been “very pleasing” and the company was now “well positioned to start fighting back in this highly competitive space.” Cooke said the firm had for the first time embarked on “rapid prototyping.” Among the products being tested in the field is UBET Live, “an innovative in-venue in-play betting module.”

Overall wagering revenue fell 1.5% to A$633m, which Tatts blamed on decreased marketing activity prior to its rebrand. But online wagering revenue was up 12.5% and Tatts now earns 25.7% of wagering revenue via digital channels, up from 22.9% a year ago. Prior to the rebrand, the Tatts.com app more than doubled its FY14 download figure to 735k devices.

Lee Davy continues his confessions series by talking about the movie Tomorrowland and why it made him cry.

Dreamers need to stick together.

Now where are they?

He’s a cute kid. A classic Gap kid from head to toe. I hate it when kids sit next to me on a plane. I hate it; always pestering me, asking me to open the blinds so they can look at the clouds; staring at me in this, ‘you look weird’ kind of way.

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but UK-listed online gambling operator GVC Holdings is upping its bid (again) to acquire rival Bwin.party digital entertainment.

On Wednesday, the Times reported that GVC and its Cerberus Capital Management backers were preparing to submit a new 130p per share offer for Bwin.party, for a total cash-and-shares consideration of around £1.1b. That’s nearly £100m more than GVC’s most recent bid earlier this month of £1.03b, which was itself marginally higher than GVC’s previous £1b bid.

The Times reported that Bwin.party’s board would meet Thursday to consider whether to accept GVC’s latest bid. The improved offer is still below the 140p per share price that Bwin.party board member Jason Ader suggested would be necessary for GVC to prevail, but who’s to say GVC can’t find another £100m or so under the sofa cushions if it looks hard enough.

Should Bwin.party’s board decide it likes the color of GVC’s money, the board is expected to allow rival bidder 888 Holdings – who believed they’d already sealed the deal with their £898m bid in July – a window of opportunity to make a counter-offer.

Denmark’s regulated online gambling market continued tis winnings ways in Q2, driven by gains in the online casino vertical.

Danish gaming regulator Spillemyndigheden says its online licensees reported revenue up 25% to DKK 335m (US $49.9m) in the three months ending June 30. That’s 24% more than the same period last year and 8% more than reported in Q1 2015. The overall gambling market, including land-based gaming, reported revenue up 11% to DKK 805m.

The casino vertical reported the bulk of online revenue, rising 28% to DKK 295m, while ‘games with commission,’ aka online poker, was flat at DKK 40m. Total sports betting revenue came to DKK 470m, up nearly 6% year-on-year and 7% sequentially. Spillemyndigheden doesn’t offer separate tallies for online and land-based sports betting,

The roughly 26k gaming machines in Danish gaming halls and restaurants reported revenue up 5% year-on-year to DKK 415m, the highest total the vertical has recorded since Q2 2013. Revenue from the country’s seven brick-and-mortar casinos rose 6% to DKK 90m.