Sports betting came to West Virginia on Thursday, officially making the state the fifth to launch legal wagering and the fourth since the US Supreme Court struck down the federal prohibition in May.

Shortly before noon on Thursday, state Delegate Jason Barrett walked into the Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races, strode up to the sportsbook window and placed a $50 wager on West Virginia University winning the national football championship. Barrett stands to collect over $3k should his homer prediction prove accurate.

Penn National Gaming (PNG) announced earlier this month that its West Virginia property would begin taking wagers on Saturday, September 1, but the William Hill-powered sportsbook decided to hold a ‘soft launch’ on Thursday.

Despite the premature speculation, the property still plans to have some official ‘grand opening’ hoopla on Saturday morning. PNG announced last week that former NFL quarterback and broadcaster Joe Theismann will be on hand for the event.

Penn National Gaming wanted to buy Pinnacle Entertainment, a company that owns a number of casinos around the US. The only thing standing in its way of the $2.8-billion deal were a number of signatures by regulatory entities. Now, Penn is one step closer, as the Missouri Gaming Commission has given its approval of the deal. If all regulators sign off on the purchase, Penn will become the largest regional gaming operator in the US with a total of 41 properties spanning 20 separate jurisdictions.

According to a statement by Tim Wilmott, Penn’s CEO, “Reflecting the progress we have made to date with securing regulatory approvals, and the timeline we have established for the remaining requisite approvals, we remain on schedule to complete the transaction early in the fourth quarter.”

Apart from the state regulatory approval, Penn also needs the blessing of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC has now made a second request for “additional information and documentary material” related to the acquisition, but didn’t disclose what prompted the request.

To allay anti-trust concerns, Pinnacle had already sold four of its original 16 properties to Boyd Gaming, leaving Penn to acquire 12. The Boyd deal was worth $575 million and saw the casino operator pick up two Ameristar casinos in Missouri and Belterra in Indiana and Ohio. Boyd is preparing to sign a lease agreement with a real estate investment trust, Gaming and Leisure Properties, which is the current landlord for the resorts.

Studio City, a Macau resort operated by Melco Resorts, has become only the second casino resort to be authorized to provide smoking lounges in the city. The other casino property is Ponte 16, which received its approval this past April.

The city’s Health Bureau revealed this past Tuesday that it was approving the Melco request. All casinos that want to continue to offer on-site smoking must apply with the bureau. The smoking lounges have stricter requirements than before, and must be equipped with air extraction devices that are more effective than what is currently permitted under current regulations. After January 1 next year, only those casinos who have received authorization will be allowed to offer smoking lounges.

According to several investment analysts, casino markets where on-site smoking has been 100% prohibited have seen a reduction in gross gaming revenue (GGR). However, the analysts emphasized that the reduction was only a temporary one, and that the GGR quickly began to climb after a brief lull.

Out of the 47 casinos and slot parlors in Macau, 13 have already applied for authorization to operate the updated smoking lounges, according to a report by the Health Bureau this week. Earlier in August, only 11 had applied. The 13 venues were not identified by name, but the bureau indicated that they had filed a total of 107 requests – 39 more than what had been submitted until the end of last month.

This past Sunday, the WPT held its first-ever Women’s Poker Summit at the Bicycle Casino in California. The summit was designed to address issues related to female participation in poker events, and how to attract a larger percentage of women. As the summit revealed, there are still several hurdles that have to be jumped to make the ladies feel welcome at the tables.

Linda Johnson, who is in both the Poker Hall of Fame and the Women in Poker Hall of Fame, got things rolling at the summit, talking about how, as a female player in the 70s and 80s, she had to deal with smoke being blown in her face from men who were trying to tell her that she didn’t belong. While smoke-blowing is no longer an issue, the chauvinistic mentality is.

Since the WSOP began about forty years ago, female participation has only risen from 1% to around 4%. Compared to the rise in men seen at events and in tournaments, this turnout is dismal and has many asking the question, “What are we doing wrong?”

The WPT, which has seen an increase of 60% in female representation at its executive level, formed the poker summit to try and answer that very question. WPT Vice President of Global Tour Management Angelica Hael pointed out that it’s not a lack of interest by the females, but partially a lack of priority.

It’s not against the rules in poker to reveal one of your cards during a hand, but it certainly is a dumb idea. A poker player found this out the hard way during a “Live at the Bike” cash game at the Bicycle Casino near Los Angeles, California this past Monday.

The fun began when “Bitcoin Yoda” made a river bet of $10,000 into a pot that already held $15,000. He was facing off against Eric Hicks, who was on the button at the time, and began to taunt his opponent a little, offering to show him one card.

While Hicks was still deciding whether or not to call or fold, he picked one of “Yoda’s” cards, which happened to be the 3 of spades. With a board of A-5-2-K-4, and only one other spade, Hicks knew his opponent couldn’t have a flush, but most likely had a 5-high straight, possibly a 6-high straight. Either way, he felt he was in good shape.

The table couldn’t believe that “Yoda” would reveal a card and Hicks was only too willing to play along. He pushed the pot to $25,000 and “Yoda,” who definitely didn’t have the force with him that day, immediately called with his flopped straight. What he didn’t expect to see, however, was what Hicks was hiding as he flipped over his cards. Three diamonds popped out between the flop and the turn, and Hicks was sitting on the 7-6 of diamonds. He picked up the win with a flush.

The Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) set yet more turnover records in its most recent fiscal year, which is basically about what you’d expect considering the club has no legal competition.

Thursday saw the HKJC release its annual results for the 12 months ending June 30, during which the gambling monopoly generated total turnover of HK$234b (US$29.8b). This astronomical sum is 8.1% higher than the HKJC reported during its fiscal 2016-17.

From this turnover, the HKJC made a return to the special administrative region’s government of HK$22.6b, contributed HK$1.2b to the Lotteries Fund and charitable donations of HK$4.2b, all of which are also records.

Racing turnover was up 6% year-on-year to a record HK$122.8b, thanks to the HKJC’s commitment to commingling its pools with other international racing giants (now 38 partners in 10 regions). The total amount wagered via commingling was up 154.8% to HK$16.6b, equal to 13.3% of 2017-18’s total.

The saga surrounding Landing International and its planned casino in Manila continues. As government officials and Landing debate whether or not the casino will go forward, the Philippine Senate is now getting involved. A lawmaker has requested that the government look into corruption allegations over the land that Landing has secured for the casino.

Senator Francis Escudero has submitted a resolution, resolution number 858, to have a committee of the Senate to investigate “supposed graft and corruption allegedly committed by the Nayong Pilipino Foundation [NPF] board of trustees and officials.” The foundation’s entire board was fired by President Duterte earlier this month, the same day that a groundbreaking ceremony for the casino was held.

Escudero further stated, “Corruption, power play, incompetence and dishonesty, especially if government is involved, adversely affect not only this particular project, but other high-stakes development projects of the government.”

This past Wednesday, the Philippine News Agency published an article stating that the project graft allegations are related to 26.3 acres of land that the NPF leased to a Landing subsidiary, Landing Resorts Philippines Development Corp., for the purpose of building the casino.

South Korea’s lone casino that accepts local customers has found itself in yet another scandal involving a former top executive.

On Thursday, the Korea Herald reported that unionized employees at the Kangwon Land casino resort had alleged that the property’s former CEO Ham Seung-hee had spent KRW70m (US$63k) of company funds on personal expenses, some of which may have been spent on a woman with whom Ham was having an extramarital dalliance.

The 67-year-old Ham, who ran the country’s largest casino from 2014 to 2017, is said to have used corporate credit cards at luxury hotels, high-end department stores and restaurants to make hundreds of personal purchases, some of which involved swimwear and toothbrushes.

Many of the purchases were made at businesses near a residential property in Seoul that is the home of the woman with whom Ham was allegedly conducting the affair. The woman works at a think-tank founded by Ham.

Asian casino operator Donaco International Ltd has finally launched its online gambling business, nearly two years after it received a license from Cambodian authorities.

On Thursday, the Australian-listed Donaco issued its annual results for the 12 months ending June 30, during which the company booked a statutory loss of AU$124.5m (US$90.4m). However, Donaco notes that the loss was due to the AU$144m non-cash impairment charge the company announced last December.

That write-down resulted from the company’s ongoing legal fight with the Thai vendor that Donaco hired to manage gaming operations at its Star Paradise Hotel, which lies next door to Donaco’s flagship Star Vegas casino in Poipet, Cambodia.

It’s a long story, but the Thai vendor refused to stop operating gaming at Star Paradise (since rechristened as Winsor) following the expiration of its contract with Donaco, then opened up a rival casino (Star Paramax) nearby while also poaching Donaco’s Thai junket operators. Donaco obtained an injunction ordering both rogue casinos to close but the case continues to wind its way through Cambodia’s legal system.