In response to the growing number of tourists visiting the Philippines, casino operator Travellers International Hotel Group, Inc. (TIGHI) announced plans to add a new hotel in Resorts World Manila (RWM).

Japan Times reported that TIGHI has inked an agreement with Tokyo-based Hotel Okura Co. to manage the new hotel under the premium Japanese brand.

The first luxury hotel of the Japanese firm, which will be constructed inside the RWM casino complex, will have 191 rooms, with a standard room size of about 60 square meters. The 11-story Hotel Okura is expected to open in the fourth quarter of 2018, according to the companies.

TIGHI and Okura also agreed to construct another 13-story hotel with 380 rooms in Bayshore City Resorts World, an integrated resort located at Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation’s (PAGCOR) Entertainment City in Pasay City. The second hotel is expected to be constructed in 2020.

For anyone who read last week’s Top 10 CalvinAyre.com interviews of 2017, you already know five of the ten interviews on the list were Bitcoin or Blockchain related.  Out of the top 10 most viewed Becky’s Affiliated columns of 2017, turns out six were Bitcoin or Blockchain related and the number one column of the year was my interview with Calvin Ayre on Bitcoin, all supporting just how disruptive the Bitcoin network will be for the online gambling industry.

The remaining four on the Becky’s Affiliated top 10 list are not surprising either, everything from an affiliate taking Affiliate Edge to court, my British Citizenship story, an interview with the world-famous Ronnie O’Sullivan and an interview with Paris Smith of Pinnacle, one of the most influential leaders in the sports betting industry.

I hope you enjoy this little trip down memory lane and bring on another year of Bitcoin and influencer-filled “Becky’s Affiliated”.

10. An affiliate industry first- an affiliate takes an affiliate program to court

Yes, it’s that time of year, when gambling scribes with nothing to write about start reminiscing about the past or predicting the future. I decided to do the latter, taking a look at five poker-related omens for 2018.

The lawnmower sits in the shed waiting for the day someone touches it, turns it on, and rides it. There is no meaning & purpose beyond the close shave of the green. The palm reader doesn’t have a narrative to weave. It is what it is, a lawnmower with a single purpose, sitting, waiting.

Are you like that lawnmower?

Are you waiting to be touched, turned on and taken for a ride? Do you have a meaning & purpose, or do you, like the lawnmower, have one sole purpose in life? Is it to be a father, a mother, a silent film actor, or a poker player?

Florida’s racing greyhounds are more or less clear to do as much cocaine as they want, after a court ruled that the state’s drug testing procedures were unlawful.

Late last week, Administrative Law Judge Lawrence P. Stevenson issued a ruling upholding a challenge brought by two dog trainers whose licenses were suspended by the state’s Division of Pari-Mutuel Wagering for allegedly supplying dogs with banned stimulants.

The two trainers, Charles McClellan and Natasha Nemeth, were suspended after dogs under their care at an Orange Park racetrack tested positive for cocaine 24 times in a two-year period. They challenged their suspension based on their argument that state regulators had never formally authorized the drug testing rules.

In 2015, a different judge ruled that the state’s 2010 procedures manual’s references to drug testing hadn’t been formally adopted. Regulators copped to the error but claimed that they were no longer circulating the manual to their staff.

The World Poker Fund Holdings has been busy this Yuletide, finding a new Chairman, creating a new subsidiary, inking deals with Oscar De La Hoya and VXL Payment Solutions, securing an online gambling license in Spain, and planning to develop $50m through an ICO and move into the crypto business.

Only once have I ever welcomed someone to the poker table by showing them a naked photograph of one of the people sitting at the poker table. Just once. Like trying to feed a peach to a puma, I won’t be doing it again.

The game was in Planet Hollywood in the midst of a beauty pageant. There were more bare legs than the table section in Ikea. Nobody could keep their eye on the game. Then Shanna Moakler sat down.

We asked her if she was participating in the beauty pageant. Moakler told us that she was leading a team, but she had once been a participant, winning the Miss New York pageant in the mid-90s, and had appeared in Playboy.

Finland is about to make life more difficult (or more responsible, depending on your perspective) for slot machine fans.

Last week, Finland’s state gambling monopoly Veikkaus used the Christmas hubbub to quietly announce plans to require slot machine players to verify their identities in order to use the machines. The changes will reportedly affect over 18k machines located in supermarkets, gas stations and other non-casino facilities.

The changes aren’t expected to fully take effect until 2023, but Veikkaus expects the new identification requirements will begin appearing on machines before then on a piecemeal basis through the natural process of upgrading older machines for new ones with enhanced features.

The precise method by which Finnish slot jockeys will be required to authenticate their identity has yet to be determined, given Veikkaus’ belief that there are likely to be rapid technological advances in this field over the next five years. Accommodations must also be made to ensure that international tourists can play the slots despite their lack of local credentials.

The ousted original developer of the $4.2b Baha Mar integrated resort in the Bahamas has filed a $2.25b fraud lawsuit against the property’s Chinese contractor.

On the day after Christmas, Sarkis Izmirlian’s BML Properties filed a claim in New York State Supreme Court, seeking $2.25b in damages from the property’s principal contractor, China Construction America (CCA), the American subsidiary of the Chinese state-owned China State Construction Engineering Corp.

Izmirlian’s Baha Mar Ltd was deposed as Baha Mar’s developer in 2015 after the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Izmirlian had long accused CCA of failing to meet development timelines, and the project was ultimately acquired by Hong Kong conglomerate Chow Tai Fook Enterprises (CTFE).

As detailed in the Bahama Tribune, the suit filed on Tuesday accuses CCA of pulling off “one of the largest construction-based frauds in this hemisphere.” Among the allegations made in the suit is CCA purposely deceiving BML regarding the progress of construction, while earning “tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions” of dollars via inflated billings and uncorrected defects.