After winning the EPT Online Event #8 for $87,984, Bert Stevens has become the first player to win two EPT Online events in history after triumphing in Event #15 too.

Just a couple of days ago, Stevens, also known by his online name ‘girafganger7’, took down the $2,100-entry Event #8, which took place in no limit hold’em, and while Event #15 was also no limit hold’em, it was quite different. First of all, it cost $10,300, which turns it from a high roller ticket event to a super high roller in online poker terms. Secondly, the prize for winning it – apart from the honour of becoming the first player to win two EPT Online titles – was more than double its predecessor, totalling $186,238.

The standard at the final table was as high as you might expect from a five-figure buy-in event, with all the action coming thick and fast in the Turbo and 6-Max format.

Vyacheslav Buldygin is a name that is well known among the high roller set, but the Russian busted first at the final table, earning $32,882 when he crashed out in 7th place. That min-cash, worth “three stacks of high society” as Mike McDermott might have called it, was followed in the payouts by the $43,901 that British player Conor Beresford won by coming 6th.

The gambling industry always needs leadership that’s looking ahead, and that’s never truer than in 2020, as we try to find a way forward during the Covid-19 pandemic. At iGaming NEXT ONLINE: Adventure of Change, Dr. Samuel H. Liggero, Professor at the Tufts Gordon Institute, delivered his tips on how to be a leader in a time of ambiguity.

Dr. Liggero began by describing exactly what it is that his institution does. “Our goal at Tufts Gordon Institute is to inspire and create a worldwide community of transformative leaders with heart, and technology driven industries, just like the iGaming industry,” he said. “Transformative means high-impact step changes to your business, or more broadly, to society. Leaders with heart are those who inspire, who persuade, and lead others with deep empathy and compassion for all. And when I say inspire and create, this means one’s leadership is characterized by incisive curiosity, a bias to action and an eagerness to experiment and take measured risks.”

There are three important traits Dr. Liggero expects a leader to have. “They are technical acumen, business acumen, and emotional intelligence,” he said.

The first part can be helped by understanding the technology that we work with, and that will be relevant soon, but a Leader shouldn’t have to do everything. Instead, they should “surround themselves, or have access to, technology subject matter experts.” Dr. Liggero emphasized why this is so important:

Argentina plays their second match of the Tri-Nations Championship as they line-up against the Wallabies at Bankwest Stadium in Sydney.

Los Pumas shocked the rugby world, defeating the All-Blacks for the first time in their history 25-15 in their opening match of the Tri-Nations. Argentina will be confident of causing a similar upset against the Wallabies at the same venue.

The historic win will see the All Blacks sink to third on the world rankings and allows Australia to claim the Tri-Nations trophy.

Australia last won the title in 2011, beating the All Blacks in Brisbane before the 2011 World Cup. Australia needs to beat Argentina over their last two matches to claim the title. The home side have lost only twice to Argentina at home in 16 games, in 1983 and most recently in 2018.

The CEO and Founder of SBC Gaming, Ramus Sojmark has made a name for himself bringing the news to the industry masses. Sojmark is the man responsible for putting together the name events in the industry. The events master sat down with Becky Liggero Fontana in this week’s episode of the Long Con to share his insights.

Sojmark points out that the success of a good event will ultimately come down to the value it brings to the industry. Sojmark found that especially challenging in the first half of 2020. “It’s a lot of quick-shifting and learning on the go and trying to create something everyone appreciates and find useful.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHBysG0pu14&feature=youtu.beVideo can’t be loaded because JavaScript is disabled: The Long Con: Rasmus Sojmark sees opportunities in the online events (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHBysG0pu14&feature=youtu.be)

The pandemic conditions meant that Sojmark and his team were quickly forced to adapt event formats to suit the digital space. Sojmark points out that the basic guidelines for evaluating the value of the event space remain the same online:

When Michigan began to test whether or not COVID-19 was under control in the state this past summer, it gave the three commercial casinos in Detroit the green light to relaunch. Having been shut down since the middle of March, they were anxious to get things going, but the strict capacity limit of just 15% put a damper on their excitement. The result was a year-on-year drop in revenue, yet they still managed to pull down in September about 80% of what they saw a year earlier. Those gains are now going to be offset after Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer ordered new COVID-19 lockdown measures as the state begins to see a new climb in the number of positive cases. 

As of this Wednesday, the casinos will need to close their doors for three weeks. There are now a total of 251,813 coronavirus cases in the state, of which 98,000 have been reported since October 15. Whitmer said when she announced the new order, If we don’t act now, thousands more will die, and our hospitals will continue to be overwhelmed. We can get through this together by listening to health experts once again and taking action right now to slow the spread of this deadly virus.”

As a result, it’s possible that the Greektown, MGM Grand Detroit and MotorCity casinos will be forced to let at least some of their staff go, but no one is commenting on the possibilities yet. Other states have had to take precautionary measures in order to stem the return of COVID-19 and many casinos have reduced their hours, but Michigan becomes the first to order a complete shutdown. The measure covers not only casinos, but theaters, night clubs, bowling alleys and any other facility that might be prime spots for indoor social gatherings and, as a result, the spread of the coronavirus. One of the few exceptions will be dining, with restaurants given approval to continue outdoor operations. 

Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) Director Robert Gordon explains, “Indoor gatherings are the greatest source of spread, and sharply limiting them is our focus. The order is targeted and temporary, but a terrible loss of life will be forever unless we act. By coming together today, we can save thousands of lives.”

Indian authorities were worried about illegal gambling gatherings over the Diwali weekend, and it appears their fears were well founded. Over 100 arrests were made during the holiday, while one town attacked a journalist for fear that they would reveal their own gambling activity.

In Kamareddy, 109 were arrested on November 14, the night of Diwali. Rs 6,49,180 ($8,713) was seized from several card games, with Rs 1,06,710 ($1,432) seized from one house alone.

Seperately in Dharwad, another 18 gambling dens were raided, resulting in 65 arrests. That set of raids resulted in RS 49 lakh ($65 thousand) being seized. Among the arrested were political leaders, businessmen and hoteliers.

The district SP of the Dharwad Rural police had warned card clubs not to offer services during the Diwali period. That warning didn’t make it to some policemen, as four constables were found in one of the dens.

Suncity Group Holdings is excited and anxious to get its next pet project in the Philippines underway. It is going to build a new casino resort in the Westside City Project in Manila and its lock on a 45-year contract to operate the property gives it a huge boost of security. Suncity regularly keeps the industry abreast of what’s going on with the progress for the resort, and has just given its latest. It now knows who will be managing the construction and development of the site, having chosen Megawide Construction Corp. to lead the way.

Megawide made two agreements for the project, according to a Suncity filing (pdf) with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The first will see the construction giant be in charge of the construction of the basement, podium and tower of the resort’s main hotel and casino and is worth around $83.19 million (HK$644.9 million). The second will cover excavation, pile cap, which forms part of a deep foundation and is often used when the ground under the construction site is soft, and lateral support construction. This agreement is worth $47 million (HK$364.3 million), bringing the total benefit to Megawide to around $130 million (HK$1 billion).

Megawide is set to get a huge chunk of change this holiday season. Suncity subsidiary SunTrust Home Developers, which will own the resort, will pay the construction company 25% of the first agreement and 28% of the second before the end of the year, for a total of almost $34 million to be delivered before December 31. The remainder will be paid over time, as different milestones of the construction are completed.

SunTrust is teamed up with Megaworld Corporation for the new resort project through an additional layer, Fortune Noble. Megaworld owns 43.5% of SunTrust, while Suncity controls 51%, while the remaining 5.5% is owned by Aurora Securities. It’s not difficult to imagine that Megaworld played a part in securing the contract with Megawide, since the two have worked on several projects (pdf) together in the past and the two have been intrinsically mixed in several ways.

Genting Singapore has returned to profit, announcing SG$54.4 million ($40.4 million) Q3 2020. That’s a big improvement on their Q2 loss of SG$163.3 million (U.S.$121.2 million), but still down year over year.

Covid-19 travel restrictions continued to cut off travel to the casino, seeing the resort down 66% year-on-year. But anything had to be an improvement over Q2, which saw a suspension of operations.

That doesn’t make year-over year drops any less pretty. Revenues as a whole were down 50% to SG$301.0 million ($223.3 million), with non-gaming revenues taking the huge drop of 74%, from SG$234,607 million ($174.4 million) to SG$59.9 million ($44.4 million). Gaming revenue was also down by 41% to SG$212.9 million ($158.0 million).

Adjusted EBITDA (Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) in Q3 fell 46% from 2019 to SG$149.0 million ($110.5 million), but improving from the Q2 loss of SG$84.9 million ($63.0 million) in Q2.

Queensland will put everything on the line in the final State of Origin Match of 2020. The Maroons will face a confident New South Wales (NSW) side at their spiritual home, Suncorp Stadium, with the series locked at one game apiece.

NSW will enter the match as favourites after comprehensively outplaying the Maroons in Game Two of the series, recording an impressive 34-10 victory. Queensland will be quietly confident of overturning the result, with playmaker Cameron Munster named to take the field.

Despite the one-sided result in Sydney, NSW will be nervous heading into Game Three in Brisbane. NSW have lost the last seven Origin deciders before their 2019 series win and prior to that last won a decider in Brisbane in 2005. Historically the numbers sit in Queensland’s favour, as the team that claimed the opening game has gone onto win the series 28 times in the last 38 years.

New South Wales coach Brad Fittler has resisted the urge to include Melbourne Storm Churchill medallist Ryan Papenhuyzen and instead named an unchanged side.