PokerStars cumpara FullTiltPoker , Bernard Tapie renunta la deal ?
Intr-o desfasurare rapida de evenimente au aparut mai intai zvonuri si apoi informatii din tot mai multe surse cu privire la situatia FullTiltPoker.
In urma cu cateva ore cineva a deschis un thread pe cel mai mare forum de poker din lume TwoPlusTwo cu titlul Big News: PokerStars Purchases FTP(?). Acest thread a fost initial sters de catre moderatorii de pe forum, insa dupa o vreme threadul a fost facut vizibil din nou cu o nota de la NoahSD ( o sursa foarte credibila de informatii din lumea pokerului ) cum ca nu stie daca informatiile sunt adevarate, insa a fost contactat de numeroase surse care i-au spus ca nu ar trebui sa stearga threadul.
La scurt timp dupa aceea au inceput sa curga informatii din mai multe surse. Alex Dreyfus ChiliGaming si iGaming magazine CEO a postat pe Twitter ca PokerStars va cumpara FullTilt pentru 750 milioane $, incluzand in acesti bani o intelegere cu DOJ si plata banilor catre jucatori.
Apoi a venit un anunt de la iGamingFrance in care se precizeaza ca Laurent Tapie a confirmat faptul ca dealul nu va avea loc si ca un comunicat de presa va fi publicat foarte curand.
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Comunicatul nu a intarziat sa apara si va prezentam integral mai jos, comunicatul de presa din partea GBT:
Groupe Bernard Tapie regrets to announce that, after seven months of intensive work, our efforts to obtain final approval of the United States Department of Justice of the agreement to acquire the assets of Full Tilt Poker have ended without success.
Ultimately, the deal failed due to two major issues.The parties could not agree on a plan for repayment of ROW players.GBT proposed a plan that would have resulted in immediate reinstatement of all ROW player balances, with a right to withdraw those funds over time, based on the size of the player balance and the extent of the player’s playing activity on the re-launched site.
All players would have been permitted complete withdrawal of their balances, regardless of whether they played on the site, by a date certain, and 94.9% of ROW players would have been fully repaid on day 1. DOJ ultimately insisted on full repayment with right of withdrawal within 90 days for all players– a surprise demand made in the 11th hour, after months of good-faith negotiations by GBT.The legal complications surrounding the deal – specifically, questions surrounding the legality of the forfeiture under non-US laws – also proved unresolvable.
All of the key assets of the FTP companies reside outside of the United States. A non-US court well might regard the purported forfeiture as a “fraudulent transaction” and declare it invalid or deem the acquirer of the assets responsible for all of those creditor obligations.Given the $80 million purchase price, and the substantial amount of cash needed to relaunch FTP, those issues ultimately proved too substantial to overcome.
GBT is very conscious of the hopes it has created – among FTP employees that they will retain their jobs, among FTP players that they will recover their balances, and among the entire poker community that the world’s finest poker platform will be relaunched and bring a needed added element of competition to a world market that today is fully dominated by a single operator.GBT cannot accept the end of those hopes.
For that reason, unless a concrete and legally viable solution is found in the very coming days to save the employees and repay the players of FTP, we will move to our own plan of action.We understand from press reports that the DOJ may have entered into an agreement with PokerStars pursuant to which PokerStars will acquire the FTP assets. If accurate, we can only assume that PokerStars determined that it was willing to accept these legal and financial risks in order to resolve its own legal situation with DOJ.
If a PokerStars acquisition of FTP means that all FTP players will be fully repaid immediately, we are very happy for the players, as their final and full repayment has always been our priority.We only regret that such a deal would signal further consolidation of a poker market already dominated by a single player – an outcome that may raise antitrust concerns and that, in the long run, is probably not good for players and for the whole online poker industry.
Cu cateva zile inainte Daniel „Jungleman” Cates a postat pe Twitter ca a auzit niste informatii foarte bune despre FullTilt dar ca nu poate spune nimic pentru ca sunt informatii confidentiale.
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Intre timp, threadul de pe TwoPlusTwo dedicat acestui subiect creste intr-un ritm ametitor si noi informatii apar, evenimentele fiind in desfasurare. In acest moment toata lumea asteapta un comunicat din partea PokerStars care ar trebui sa lamureasca situatia.
Majoritatea speculeaza ca PokerStars vrea sa ajunga la o intelegere cu DOJ si sa rezolve situatia aparuta in urma Black Friday. In acest sens cauta sa stinga orice conflict intre DOJ si companiile de poker online. In urma aparitiei UIGEA in 2006, PartyGaming a platit 300 mil $ pentru a scapa de orice acuzatie din partea DOJ.
