They actually went into tremendous detail about the comments and have to be held accountable for their answers. So yeah, they do make a difference.

I read through the final regulations. While the FRS noted all the comments, essentially it ignored them; big surprise. The final regulations are pretty much the same as the proposed regulations.
IMO, they are subject to all the potential legal challenges that comments have raised. IMO, several parties will file litigate to injoin enforcement of these regulations. I hope that the PPA is one of these parties.

Nice catch.

Sounds like cashouts won't be blocked?

Correct.

btw just a note but after reading the regs, parts of them don't sound that bad? The framers even seem to give credit to the fact that poker might be a game of skill. At no point do they come out and say that poker is not a skill-based game, and seem to only say that a game may be considered a game of chance even if there is some chance involved.

This makes a lot of sense for them to put in regardless of the situation though, because once you say poker is definitely a skill game, then games like blackjack and others that are further along on the chance continuum can start to argue their cases...

Am I reading into this wrong?

Funding has always been the easy part......

It's not that the regulations are that bad, but that banks will bend over backwards to comply and thus overblock everything which is the cheapest method of compliance.

I still don't see how they can stop third party, 'middle men' from transferring funds from US customers to online poker sites. And since there does not seem to be any burden put directly onto the sites themselves, just the banks, then there doesn't seem to be any reason the sites would disallow US players to continue playing on their site as long as they can find a way to get money onto the site.

I mean hell, how the **** is the US govt. gonna stop me from paypalling some guy in Europe $200 who already has an FTP/Stars account and then he just transfers me the money in-game? Do they plan on invading the Isle of Man, seizing their servers and reviewing every transaction made?

Since it specifically said transactions coming FROM the sites to the player aren't prohibited, I hardly see how this thing has any teeth whatsoever.

It's ridiculous, the arrogance of the US govt. knows no bounds.

Yes exactly. This is the real danger.

Someone's dad works for a large bank and posted a memo that they sent nationally, basically saying that all gambling was legal. The Treasury's solution to adhere to State Rights was to let the local banks/branches decide, which is a cop out they know will lead to blanket prohibition.

Some banks will, some won't? Also it's very hard to cashin now isn't it? Everyone complains to me that they don't know how to cashin to the websites? Pretty sure the majority of cards don't work, although I think there are some that do?

It has been said here many times:

The avid player who wants to put money on a site will always be able to.

It's the average weekend guy who wants to blow $100 on a Friday night after a long week that won't be able to figure out how.

Thus the supply of "noobs" from the US dwindles.....

If they truly wanted a complete prohibition then they would have made it a crime to play. But they didn't do that and have instead left loopholes big enough that you can drive through so the dedicated player can continue to play. Seems like a typical D.C. lip service job to make the nutjobs happy.

I guess the US fish might become an endangered species, but that just means its time to find a new pond...

How could the FRS go against such well-written and articulate comments/arguments like this?

Unfortunately, I think we often jump too quickly into figuring out how to get around things, rather than how we're going to stand up for our rights as Americans. I have no doubt we'll figure out workarounds, but let's start with pushing back for our liberty.

As for workarounds, everything you listed assumes sites will jump through all the hoops to keep servicing Americans. This depends on more than a threat of invasion. They'll need to make a profit for doing it, and they'll need to keep access to the banking system for their other operations. There are too many unknowns at this time to know for sure that reputable sites will always be there. So, it's in our best interest to stand strong.

The "teeth" really do come from deposit restrictions. After all, how are sites to turn a profit with no incoming cash flow?

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