Three short stories from the world of poker that don’t merit top billing, including Max Silver sitting in a Limit-Hold’em game with $600,000 wishing he didn’t, PokerStars adding a 62nd event to the World Championships of Online Poker schedule, and another appeal from Phil Ivey. 

Imagine you win a poker tournament for €600,000. You’re in a casino in a foreign country. How do you get the goods from the winning post, safely into your bank account?

Well, this is how it happened for Max Silver after the British pro took down the 327-entrant €10,300 No-Limit Hold’em High Roller at the PokerStars European Poker Tour Barcelona for €600,924.

If you win money on the European Poker Tour (EPT), you can wire it to your PokerStars account. It’s a win-win for both parties. You get your money a tad closer to home, and Stars get the opportunity to convince you to spend it all, playing online.

Australian and New Zealand casino operator SkyCity Entertainment Group is demonstrating its commitment to responsible gambling by inviting public health providers onto the floor of its flagship Auckland venue.

This week marks Gambling Harm Awareness Week (GHAW) in New Zealand and this year’s event marks the first time the country’s largest casino operator SkyCity was invited to participate, a chance the company jumped at, according to general manager of support services Callum Mallet.

SkyCity’s invitation came from Hāpai Te Hauora, the Maori Public Health authority. A total of seven different providers of problem gambling support will be at SkyCity Auckland for four to nine hours per day to provide information and take bookings from any SkyCity customer who feels their gambling behavior is growing out of control.

SkyCity already offers a variety of self-exclusion options, ranging from three months to two years, that can apply to an individual casino or on a group-wide basis. Extended family members can also request exclusion if they feel a loved one’s gambling has passed the point of mere entertainment.

Arkansas voters will finally get a chance to weigh in on whether their state should authorize two new casinos and expand gaming options at two racetrack casinos.

On Wednesday, the Arkansas Secretary of State’s office announced that pro-casino lobby group Driving Arkansas Forward (DAF) had obtained 99,988 valid signatures on a ballot petition, exceeding the 84,589 signatures required for the casino question to appear on this November’s election ballot.

Issue 4 on the November 6 ballot seeks to authorize one new casino in each of Jefferson and Pope counties, while allowing the slots-only casinos at the Oaklawn and Southland racetracks to add live table games and sports betting.

DAF is largely driven by two Oklahoma Indian tribal groups, the Quapaw tribe’s Downstream Development Authority and the Cherokee Nation Businesses LLC. These two groups provided the overwhelming bulk of the $2.3m that DAF raised to fund its casino ballot quest.

Macau’s leading junket operator Suncity Group has inked a partnership with a major casino project in Cambodia’s Sihanoukville province.

On Wednesday, Suncity Group Holdings Ltd informed the Hong Kong Stock Exchange that it had entered into a strategic partnership with Golden Sun Sky Entertainment Co Ltd, which is building a US$360m, 650k-square-foot integrated resort in Sihanoukville that hopes to open to the public by the end of 2019.

Suncity says its role will be to provide “certain consultancy services” to Golden Sun Sky’s resort, which has been licensed to operate casino gaming, sports betting, hotels and duty-free market facilities in Cambodia. However, Suncity says its obligations could expand as the parties formalize specific contracts.

Sihanoukville, located on Cambodia’s southwestern coast, has witnessed an influx of Chinese nationals in recent years thanks to a flood of local infrastructure projects and increased tourist travel. Where the Chinese go, gambling inevitably follows, and Sihanoukville has witnessed an explosion in small-scale land-based and online gaming operations that has concerned some local officials.

Troubled German online gambling operator Mybet has shut its online sportsbook and casino but assures customers that they will – eventually – get their money back.

On Tuesday, the Malta-licensed Mybet gambling site’s homepage switched to a notice informing visitors that its gaming operations had been “paused … until further notice.” The message said that all open bets have been cancelled and the stakes would be credited to customers’ accounts.

Mybet assured customers that it could “guarantee all account balances are safe as they are protected” by the Malta Gaming Authority’s ‘Gaming Protection Regulation.’ However, “because of regulatory requirements that come into play in this situation, withdrawals will be carried out with significant delays.” Mybet asked customers to be “patient” after submitting withdrawal requests.

The news pushed Mybet’s stock price down nearly one-third on Frankfurt’s Xetra exchange on Wednesday. After a brief spike in Tuesday’s late trading, the shares have now fallen to just €0.03, roughly half their value from one month ago. The shares were worth €1.66 as late as June 12.