Online Gambling

In light of the Democrats winning control of the United States Congress on Tuesday, I am more convinced than ever that the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act is here to stay.

The burden of the UIGEA is placed squarely on the shoulders of financial institutions (we’ll see to what extent in the next six moths or so as the actual regulations are crafted); since the Dems are less likely than Republicans to take steps to remove regulations that govern corporate behavior, I’m betting that we’ll be dealing with the UIGEA for at least the next two years.

Immediately after the passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (links to large PDF), I contacted the more than 550 gaming sites that are listed at The Online Casino Gambling Directory regarding their policy on US-based real-money wagering. Here are the results thus far:

• 63% of the gaming sites have published an official policy.
• Of those that have published an official policy, 27% have stated that they will no longer accept US-based real-money wagering, while the remaining 73% have stated that they will continue to accept US-based real-money wagering. (Some of the 73% accept US-based real-money wagering from only certain states — I’ll have a breakdown soon, so keep an eye here for that data).

Here are the lists if you are interested:

• Gaming sites that no longer accept US-based real-money wagering
• Gaming sites that continue to accept US-based real-money wagering (from all or most states)
• Gaming sites that have not yet published a policy

[Note: The links above are dynamically generated and will change over time, so keep that in mind if you click on them more than a day or two after I published this blog entry.]

I have published each gaming site’s policy at The Online Casino Gambling Directory; just click the US flag graphic to the right of each site’s name in the Search Results List.

The Act is due to be signed today. I have noticed that a number of sites have switched their policy from “business as usual” when the Act was passed to “no US-based real-money wagering” now that the Act is about to be signed into law. Kinda like they checked, were raised, and now folded.