Sports betting operator FanDuel is now streaming National Hockey League games via its betting app, while New Jersey regulators have fined FanDuel for allowing underage patrons to place wagers.

On Monday, FanDuel announced that it reached a deal with the NHL and the league’s IMG Arena partner to livestream up to two games per day within the company’s betting app. The stream will only be available in states where FanDuel is licensed and will consist only of out-of-market games to avoid stepping on local broadcasters’ turf.

The deal marks yet another betting-friendly move by a major North American pro sports league since the US federal betting ban was struck down in 2018. NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly told ESPN that after “allowing our brand to be associated with sports betting companies, [the streaming deal] was not a far leap.”

The streams will only be available to FanDuel customers “who have a funded sportsbook account or placed a wager on the event.” It’s worth noting that this is the exact same criteria for viewing that got the UK media in such a frothy state after betting operators struck deals with IMG Arena to stream English Football Association Cup matches. Will America’s puritans follow suit? Watch this space.

Organizers of the Global Gaming Expo (G2E) Asia in Macau have postponed the event by two months due to the ongoing coronavirus crisis.

On Tuesday, the G2E Asia event’s promoters, the American Gaming Association (AGA) and Reed Exhibitions, announced that the 2020 event originally scheduled to take place at the Venetian Macao casino during May 19-21 had been postponed to July 28-30.

The official announcement said the organizers had been monitoring the global health crisis sparked by the spread of the COVID-19 disease and that its “top priority is ensuring a safe environment” for its staff, exhibitors and delegates. The decision to postpone was made “out of an abundance of caution” and following consultations with both exhibitors and the Macau government.

The organizers vowed to distribute a “supplement agreement for our cooperation” around one week from Tuesday. Further updates will be issued as they become available.

Some poker books are obvious from the moment they are published. ‘Why did it take them so long?’ you might ask. Poker Brat: The Phil Hellmuth Story is one such poker book, and the most shocking element of the book is that it took until 2017 to be brought to the public by D & B Publishing.

Making a book about the Poker Brat, a.k.a. 15-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth comes across as a labour of love and Hellmuth, while never shy to speak about the ‘Positivity’ that he brings to the game (indeed, his latest book is titled Positivity), is very open about what has brought him so far in the game.

This book, however, doesn’t start and end with Hellmuth at the poker felt. His upbringing in the American Midwest is already something he’s spoken about in a few interviews, including one this reporter conducted with him around the time of this book’s publication.

“I can dodge bullets, baby!”

We’ve previously seen how Bitcoin SV can become both the payment system and data layer for gambling operators, improving the efficiency of both and ultimately, the company’s bottom line. On February 20 at CoinGeek London, Tokenized CEO James Belding took to the stage to explain how his company can marry both pieces to create an end to end product for any company.

Belding began by describing the current status quo for most companies. Transactions are generally bundled, and settled in a “netted” system, where a third party takes on the risk of finalizing a transaction between two parties. “Bitcoin will become the ‘real-time’ gross settling system,” Belding declared. He explained:

“The exciting thing here is every single transaction, even at point of sale, retail, payments, financial instruments, everything can be done on a gross basis, and we no longer need these netted settlement layers.”

This can be done thanks to the speed, efficiency, and low cost of using the BSV blockchain, but also through the advanced capabilities of smart contracts to define terms. Contracts, coded to the blockchain, will signal when terms are met and pay out the involved parties accordingly. Oracles, Belding explained, work as a messaging system, defining the legal status of ownership of tokens. The result is that BSV becomes a universal source of truth for data records.

A friend of mine owns a distillery, a connoisseur type of guy. He distills whisky, absinthe, grappa, and other assorted spirits. We usually hang out on Thursday nights and one of those nights he went on about the history of distilling. One detail he shared that stayed with me just for the imagery is that back in the 18th century, when someone went down into the area where primary fermentation was taking place, they would tie a rope around his waist and pull him out if he didn’t come back after a certain period of time. People would routinely faint in there from CO2 asphyxiation and if they weren’t pulled out immediately, they could suffocate and die.

Whether you want to picture a canary in a coalmine or a distiller in a fermentation room, it’s time to check on that bird or pull on that rope. Things could get a little nutty over the next few weeks and months, and the gambling sector could very well take a lead role as indicator. In fact, it might already be doing so.

We just saw three all time records over the last 8 trading days in the U.S. equity markets. The first was the pace of the selloff, the major indexes shedding more points last week than any other week in history. Second, the same indexes gained back more points just yesterday than any other day in history. Notice though, which stocks kept falling despite the record rally – specifically the most highly leveraged and overbought U.S. casino momentum stocks.

Leave that last point to one side though for a second. I didn’t mention the third record yet, which is the craziest of the three. Long term Treasuries rallied so hard that yields collapsed by a higher percentage than any other week in history. There isn’t even a close second place. Last week, yields on the 10Y fell 23.4%, a total of 34.4 basis points on the week. The runner up was the second week of December 2008 at 17.7%. Counting from February 19th, yields on the 10Y collapsed a total of 54 basis points from top to bottom, for a mind-numbing fall of 33% in all of 8 trading days.

In a probe that becomes more disturbing with each revelation, it is now being alleged by Philippines Senator Risa Hontiveros that Bureau of Immigration (BRI) employees were likely selling Philippines passports to Chinese nationals, allowing them to get easy access to enter the country.

Passports, birth certificates, and bank accounts were up for sale, according to Hontiveros in a recent Senate hearing. BI officials also offered “de-listing from blacklists and airport release if barred entry” to Chinese tourists that were planning on traveling to the Philippines. She provided captured screenshots of advertisements offering the service as evidence.

“They can even give Philippine passports to Chinese tourists… Obviously, these are criminal acts. Two agencies are advertising these criminal services freely,” the senator said.

Hontiveros has been outspoken in her call to investigate the BI. She has pointed out a number of highly questionable behaviors and information that has presented the likelihood of corruption at the agency. This includes her pointing to a Salary Grade 13 employee, earning approximately PHP 24,000 a month ($472), reporting a net worth of PHP 5 million ($98,000) and able to fund a run for the mayor of Muntinlupa City in both 2018 and 2019.

In a probe that becomes more disturbing with each revelation, it is now being alleged by Philippines Senator Risa Hontiveros that Bureau of Immigration (BRI) employees were likely selling Philippines passports to Chinese nationals, allowing them to get easy access to enter the country.

Passports, birth certificates, and bank accounts were up for sale, according to Hontiveros in a recent Senate hearing. BI officials also offered “de-listing from blacklists and airport release if barred entry” to Chinese tourists that were planning on traveling to the Philippines. She provided captured screenshots of advertisements offering the service as evidence.

“They can even give Philippine passports to Chinese tourists… Obviously, these are criminal acts. Two agencies are advertising these criminal services freely,” the senator said.

Hontiveros has been outspoken in her call to investigate the BI. She has pointed out a number of highly questionable behaviors and information that has presented the likelihood of corruption at the agency. This includes her pointing to a Salary Grade 13 employee, earning approximately PHP 24,000 a month ($472), reporting a net worth of PHP 5 million ($98,000) and able to fund a run for the mayor of Muntinlupa City in both 2018 and 2019.

With the merger between Irish betting giant Flutter Entertainment and the Stars Group (TSG) going smoothly, the Dublin office of TSG has been laying off employees in anticipation of the completion. The company’s Cherrywood, Co Dublin office has seen a decline from 330 employees to 260 over the past year, as reported by the Irish Times.

Another group that is responsible for providing customer service for TSG has been told that their jobs are likely to go. Some have been told that they are being laid off while others will find that their jobs will soon be phased out. Others have been offered alternative positions within the company.

TSG has explained that Pokerstars operations faced challenges in 2019 which led to cost-cutting measures, regardless of their deal with Flutter. “We believe our proposals will help us to deliver long-term sustainable growth. Dublin remains an important hub for the business.”

While TSG was having a difficult 2019, Flutter was extremely successful this last year, recording revenues that topped £2.14b. That was a 14% increase over the previous year and was fueled by an increase of 113% in sports betting revenue. This saw the company reach a total of £1.67b.