Partial Recovery of US Poker Players Funds

The past fifteen years saw the internet advancing many dramatic changes in our lives and forcing a new social and financial order with many businesses and social activities previously held on land, migrating to the online arena.

Online gambling is such a business that has shown constant rise in revenues and numbers of active customers the world over.

However in spite of its meteoric rise, online gambling remains a gray area in many countries that chose to ban it and in many other countries that constantly seek new ways of regulating it for their financial benefit and for the security of its residence.

In the US online gambling has been deemed an illegal activity since the passing of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) in 2006 and created a situation where offshore companies, in violation of US Federal laws, were providing online gambling services to US players.

This situation continues undisturbed until the events of Black Friday and the indictments by the Department of Justice (DOJ) against the founders the online gambling companies that violated US law.

Following the events of Black Friday the DOJ agreed to free up the seized domains in order to allow the gambling companies to return funds to US players.

Now John Pappas, executive director for Poker Players Alliance from Washington D.C. has stated that he doubts that full recovery of US poker players funds will be possible.

He claims it is difficult to estimate the exact amounts held by the gambling companies but he said that "… an estimated 100,000 professional players who have tens of thousands of dollars … select few may have even a couple of million dollars on account."

Pappas claims that the actions of the DOJ have created an impossible situation where millions of dollars are "held up in limbo… It's impossible to put an exact number on it, I would estimate at least $100 million if not as much as $500 million."