What are current interest rates in Vanatu (or wherever the cash is/might be)? Over here they are 0.5% so if they are comparable, the annual interest wouldn't cover the losses of any of the higher bankrolled players.

Forget interest, just getting the capital back would be a frigging miracle.

If those #@#$ker are so blatantly trying to steal our money, why should we not try to get every cent out of them.

Interesting read in the Liquidator's report.

According to the Tusk financial statements they were $4.6M overdrawn at the bank on June 30, 2007. Tusk lost an additional $942K to Jan 30, 2008 and yet when the Liquidators recieved their appointment the overdraft was gone.

It must be a coincidence that the difference is $5.542M when the players purse was $5.5M.

Or maybe

or maybe?

Or maybe Mellowman knows more than he is insinuating?

Often overdrafts are paid off just before a company goes down as the bank has the taken personal guarantees of their debt from the directors.

Frankly the whole thing stinks to high heaven, but $2500 isn't worth the rise in blood pressure it would cause me if I really gotinto it.

If you are putting money into an MG site other than Ladbrokes it's your look out IMHO.

BTW did the Unibet rep ever come back to confirm whether they can dip player funds for their operating expenses or not? By his silence I am guessing they can..

I'm suprised with the number of affected players involved that no one has tumbled to the fact that when the Liquidators issue the dividend cheques the largest recipient will be the authors of the debacle.

I've mentioned this before. At least battlefield is claiming that they will use dividends to help pay the players. No idea what the other skins will do though

I was under the impression MGS was likely to be awarded a dividend as well. Not sure how accurate this is though.

Battlefield is not the largest single creditor.

The authors of the debacle are and they will be awarded a huge dividend for their incompetence.

And that would be who? And that information is shown where?

If you review the Liquidator's report the Trade Creditors are owed $2M.

Also noted in the report is a Management and Operational Services Agreement with Fuze Media Pty Ltd, (trade creditor)

Fuze Media Pty Ltd owned 104,177/106,221 of the shares of Tusk, (98% of the shares).

It follows that Fuze Media represents the largest portion of the $2M in trade credit and therefore will recieve the largest dividend cheque.

From the beginning of the thread in the Zoo, this has played out like the old tale of the blind men and the elephant, (appropriate when dealing with a company called Tusk)

From Wikipedia:

"In various versions of the tale, a group of blind men (or men in the dark) touch an elephant to learn what it is like. Each one touches a different part, but only one part, such as the side or the tusk. They then compare notes on what they felt, and learn they are in complete disagreement. The story is used to indicate that reality may be viewed differently depending upon one's perspective, suggesting that what seems an absolute truth may be relative due to the deceptive nature of half-truths."

In order to more fully understand what has truly transpired here one has to do a lot of research and understand the implications of what they uncover.

Starting with, who are Kenneth Talbot and Robert James Canning-Ure, their backgrounds and how they make their money.

Why would an Australian company register an offshore company where they are not allowed to do business?

Why would a company that was effectively bankrupt try to represent a value of $19M in a reverse takeover of a publically listed company?

When required by law to hold the player's purse in a segregated account how does a company manage to get a hold of those funds anyway?

Why does a company who is consistently losing money continue rather than go into liquidation sooner to mitigate losses?

When going into liquidation how does a company steer the type of liquidation into one with the least scrutiny by the creditors?

I'm not seeing the whole elephant yet and am actually statute barred from seeing the whole picture without a court order but what evidence I have been able to piece together I think that an investigation by ASIC has the chance to force a full recovery of the players purse.

You mean this? http://ppb.ethan.com.au/Report_to_Creditors-March09.pdf

OK, while I see that Tusk was almost completely owned by Fuze, where does it say they are a trade creditor? Is that because of the loans made by Fuze to Tusk? Surely that is going to written off?

I don't understand what you are talking about ( I'm a housewife Jim, not a lawyer). All I read are guesses, assumptions, insinuations and corporate-speak couched in legal terms that I assume are designed to actually mean one thing but look like they mean something completely different.

The authors of the debacle were afaiac MGS as they were the ones who forced Tusk (and therefore the 28 poker skins) out of business.

You are clearly hinting that the ultimate (no pun intended) owners/creators of Tusk were crooks who set the whole thing up to scam us out of our money and MGS were duped just like we all were, except that it doesn't seem that MGS came out too badly as they actually profited out of Tusk while they were active and lost nothing when they went out of business whereas we poor chumps - well not so much.

This is the bit I don't understand.

Yes

A trade creditor is a creditor that provides goods or services to a company. Fuze Media operated Tusk via their Management and Operational Services Agreement thusly making them the largest trade creditor.

The loans to and from Fuze were a part of their creative bookeeping efforts and do not appear anywhere in the Liquidator's report post appointment. One has to surmise they were dealt with pre-liquidation.

This is what Tusk was counting on.

MGS did not force Tusk out of business, they were already broke. When MGS pulled the licenses of BFP and Red9's, Tusk would have had to pony up the players purse and the $1M they owed BFP, if BFP and Red9's been able to change networks, (without Tusk). They clearly did not have the funds available and thus went into liquidation.


MGS may or may not require copies of annual statements from their operators, that is information I'm not privy to. In any case Tusk did some creative bookeeping in 2006 that made the company appear stronger than it actually was. Additionally this allowed them to get approved for their safe and fair seals from eCOGRA.

The true extent of Tusk's problems would have started to surface in the 2007 statements which is reason I believe that eCOGRA pulled those seals in Jan 2008.

I truly believe that the ultimate owners of Tusk did set this up as a scam to separate the players from their funds.

Of course MGS hasn't faired too badly they were a service provider that recieved their compensation monthly for services provided.


There is slightly less than $1.4M available for distribution.

There are submitted proof of debts of $6.8M

If Fuze(Tusk) has submitted proof of debt and it is the majority of the trade credit then they will realize a dividend of $2M/$6.8M ~ $406K leaving slightly less than $1M for everyone else.

Are you saying that a company (lets call them Fuze) can create a subsidiary company (say, Tusk) and then be a major creditor when that company goes bust and entitled to a large share of any cash still existing in the business?

If that is true AND LEGAL, the law, business and capitalism all suck big time. It's clearly ridiculous but I begin to see why accountants and lawyers in the business sector earn so much money and why a complete lack of morality would be a prerequisite for that kind of job.

Methinks you are now starting to understand, although in this case Fuze (Talbot and Canning-Ure) 'bought' Tusk from Talbot and Canning-Ure and as Fuze were engaged to manage Tusk and all their affairs.

On the surface of it what has transpired has the appearance of being legal, however, Tusk's and Fuze's books may indicate a different picture.

Unfortunately the way this was set up, the only people that have a legal right to examine those books are the ASIC.

RedNines was the only site on the MG network I was registered to. I had been playing there for quite some time. I was completely loyal I never switched skins for higher rakeback, I was making like 30% maybe 40% when I first got on, it didn't matter to me I didn't care. I liked the site and was sticking with it. What did my loyalty get me? 5 figures stolen.

too much legal mumbo jumbo ITT for me

bump

Typically cases like this don't get to court for upwards of 2 years from the commencement of the action. Since it appears no action has yet commenced, look for the commencement then add 2 years, that would be the approximate time frame.

wow

You didn't mention that last year - you just said it would be at least a year before the liquidators knew the score IIRC (not a bad estimate).

Mellowman, I'm a complete cynic and always suspect the worst about everything and everyone so please don't mind my next question.

Are Microgaming paying you?

No, Microgaming are not paying me. I've had no contact with MGS.

I continue to play on the network on a daily basis which I'm sure that MGS employees wouldn't be allowed to do.

Additionally, if I see proof that MGS is culpable in any way for whats happened I will post that info and demand that they make good on their failings.

Not all operators are created equally and there continue to be operators on MGS that I will not deposit with, they just don't pass my due diligence.

That being said there are operators on every network that don't pass my tests.

My reasons for posting in the MGS/Battlefield/Tusk threads are to try and clarify a lot of the misinformation that is posted.

I've always been a nosy bugger and the more I looked into this situation, (over 200 hours of background research now) the clearer it has become for me, Tusk was never meant to be a viable entity.

I spent half my working life looking for loopholes in our laws to exploit and profit from. During those years I saw lots of other people who used loopholes to maliciously make a profit at other people's expense.

I remain of the opinion that pursuing Tusk is a road to nowhere. We will all most likely be long dead before possible criminal charges can be brought, followed by the eternal subsequent process of trying to reacquaint players with whatever money is available. This would be a minefield of absolutely monumental proportions.

The emphasis should be on Microgaming.

To put some perspective on this situation lets take a look at some facts.

MGS recently barred some very large forums from advertising any MGS operator.

In Nov 2008 MGS barred any new USA account signups to any of their sites.

In Jan 2009 2 of the larger MGS poker sites, Doyles and Poker Host were allowed to leave because MGS wouldn't change their stance on new USA accounts.

During the year that this has been discussed in the Zoo, Unibet has had customer growth from 2.3M to 3.1M of which 292K are active. Ladbrokes has had customer growth in their egaming sector of 21% with 172K active casino players and 146K active poker players.

Tusk had fewer than 3K poker players in total much less active.

Not a lot of incentive there to assist the players to the tune of $4M, MGS business just continues to expand in spite of any negative comments in this forum.

I'm not saying to abandon trying to entice MGS to do something but when the ultimate owner of Tusk has a net worth in excess of $1.4B and there lies any possibility of pressure being brought to bear on him to make good, why would anyone suggest its a waste of time and energy?