eGaming Morning Snapshot - 8 February 

 

Mfuse has announced that the Deal Or No Deal fixed-odds betting game is now available via mobile with Ladbrokes. The game is identical to the online version, with both a free-play and play-for-cash mode. Mfuse said it planned to roll the game out to other operators.

 

It’s a bumper day for gambling in the UK press, with Bodog’s Calvin Ayre interviewed in the Guardian, The Times running a story about a possible pursuit of Gala Coral on the part of Harrah’s, and Ladbrokes getting some decent coverage of its deal yesterday to buy Northern Ireland’s Eastwood chain of bookies. eGaming Review will report more on all these stories in a special paper review later today. We will also be reporting on the bookies’ reaction to the English Premier League’s plans to introduce an “international round” for the 2010/11 season. While football fans express outrage, the bookmakers are delighted at the prospect.

 

Two French MPs sent to Brussels on a fact finding mission about the liberalisation of online gambling have highlighted the “terrifying reality” of internet games. Emile Blessig and Jacques Myard have warned against a complete opening of the market and said a world of “criminality and illegal betting” surrounded online gaming.

 

The National Basketball Association (NBA) spent US$330,000 on lobbying during 2007, with particular emphasis on keeping UIGEA intact. According to the US Senate’s public records office, the NBA paid McGuirewoods Consulting to lobby congress on federal decency guidelines, including the maintenance of a ban on sports gambling, and to “strengthen the prohibition against internet gambling.”

 

The Financial Times says the Gambino family has had its “criminal enterprises” supported by numerous internet gaming operations run from Costa Rica,  according to New York’s Queens district attorney: “Websites such as betallsports.com and betoffshore.net allegedly helped net almost $10m in wagers over two years.” Twenty people were arrested over the allegations yesterday, the paper said.

 

Online gaming services provider New Media Lottery Services has secured an additional US$1m working capital from two of its directors, Milton and Joseph Dresner.

 

For more news, go to www.egrmagazine.com

 

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