I thought the same thing as I read through this thread -- in fact, zerosum's post was particularly interesting to me. (Seriously, thanks for that explanation.)

But even more interesting to me: that OP found this information is not surprising nowadays, I want to know what sent him looking for it in the first place.

Uh.. it's a public record. Not sure how this is an invasion of privacy?

There were a few articles on it back in the day. I live in one of the states that enacted that type of legislation and remember it was in the local papers as well. There was an article on Slate.com but I can't seem to find it.

A lot of people stopped going to foreclosure auctions in my area because the bank rep would announce that their upset price was market value.

Not sure about the States but in Canada if you have a 1st and 2nd, normally the 2nd mortgage holder is the one to take over the home.

Simply because if the 1st mortgage holder takes the home the fees and costs associated with a repo become quite high and would eat into the chance of the 2nd reclaiming anything. So the 2nd jumps in to save thier investment and tries to sell the home. If there is no value, they have to decide what losses they are willing to suck up or try to collect.

The 2nd actually starts making payments to the 1st if they want to keep the 1st from forclosing.

After the dust settles, the home is sold and money divided anything outstanding (shortfall) can be collected from the homeowner (ex-homeowner). At this point is when people claim bankruptcy. Then yes, they can walk. Credit is screwed but they can walk.

Would cash? I didn't even mention donkaments. If you stake someone in a cash game and are asking for a percentage of profits rather than a set ROI (like a bank) then I'd call you a moron.

Yeah, a lot of stuff is public record, but spoonfeeding that info unsolicited to thousands of random people could still be reasonably considered an invasion of privacy.

It would destroy the market for staking players for high stakes games but whether it would destroy the games themselves would depend on how many players get staked for them. The financial collapse was going to happen regardless if people like you and I took advantage of the system, simply because there were so many idiots getting houses they couldn't afford. My point is that you might as well take advantage of these opportunities, particularly if your long term plan is to only deal in cash anyways.

So it would be like borrowing money to play high stakes when you already have a bankroll to buy in yourself. You are essentially on a freeroll and this particular staker (the bank) will never collect the money from you if you fail. In the future you aren't going to get staked but 1) You don't need to because you already have a bankroll and 2) the market would have collapsed anyways in which case it would have been difficult to get staked anyways.

No it can't. Invasion of privacy is a legal term, and broadcasting public records is in no way an invasion of privacy.

he makes his money by being a public figure, therefore you forfeit a certain level of privacy imo

I wasn't completely clear on what he posted, but he is right in that the loan originators were selling the papers. The simplified explanation would be that the backer is backing tons of horses and then making a commission by selling these contracts to other backers. A 3rd party is rating these as excellent investments, when in fact they should be rated as junk. Thus, the original backer is also in the clear unless he gets stuck with some of these agreements when the **** hits the fan.

Maybe being asked for an autograph or picture but not posting financial records on the internet.

Dont get me wrong I find it interesting, but I wouldnt have posted it.

Unless the backer, let's call him Goldman Bax, realized that the jig was about to be up and bought billions of dollars worth of SHTF insurance from AIG and when the SHTF and AIG couldn't pay off this insurance the government stepped in and paid it for them. It was easy to get the government to give up the money because Goldman Bax was now running things.

I don't think anyone in this thread is talking about it in the legal sense.

Don't want to derail this too much but maybe you should brush up on how staking works in the real world.

This is typical for staking in cash games

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/13...aking-1249403/

I think Barry needs to come on in here and explain himself asap, this is getting out of control

I'll chip in $10 for a staking arrangement till he gets back up on his feet

Yeah he is but the tears kind of ballin......"why did I start gambling with Ivey?"

Maybe FTP will give Barry a 400K loan (no interest or payback date) and bump up his FTP IOU figure to 800K.

Oh, that's right, FTP has new owners... so maybe not.

Especially not out of their players money.

excellent post tucco. real creative.

Bling blang blauw the bank owns my house now. Seriously though, one of the good guys in this game, no doubt. He made no apologies or excuses for being broke in the past and if he is broke, my guess is he'll land on his feet*. In the meantime, plenty of people got real help from him all these years, and that matters. It's only money, and Barry is a class act and a terrific player who will prevail eventually. I mean, that amout of money is a joke to his friend Ivey, right? Apparently he hasn't asked for help from Ivey, so that ought to tell you what kind of a guy he is right there.

* he writes about being broke in his book, earlier in his career.

I understand the math of someone might let his house foreclose and how that is +ev for him BUT isn't there something to be said for being a man and paying your debts?

Don't people buy homes with the expectation of increasing in value(as well as a place to live). When that doesn't work out is it not unethical to walk away and leave someone else holding the bag?

Isn't this similar to someone borrowing money to play poker with the expectation of winning, then when the person loses they just decide not pay back his loan, is that ok?

It is similar if the person you borrowed the money from now owns your house

Its a morally complex thing. The bank does get the house back, and you cannot say that the banks had nothing to do with the housing bubble that ran up prices and eventually crashed. To some extent you have a point, but it's more of a grey situation than black or white.

So had anyone confirmed if he is busto or not?

I heard he was playing 1-2nl and 4-8 O8 with a kill at the Harrah's in New Orleans. Poor Barry, I always liked the guy.

No, because the entity lending the money is being compensated for risk, one of which is a strategic default if the value of the underlying asset goes down. The government and corporate America likes to make people feel guilty for strategic defaults but corporations do it all the time. Corporate bond investors are aware of that risk the same as mortgage-backed securities investors are aware of it. To argue otherwise is to argue that they should be compensated for a riskless transaction and that just doesn't happen in a free market economy unless you happen to be a member of the federal reserve system

Thanks for the info. I never accused poker players of being good businessmen. It's a foolish move to ever structure a deal as % of profits in virtually any business. Fortunately in poker, there aren't any expenses one can move money into (albeit, nothing would surprise me) but the risk is still substantial when you consider that you are trusting the other player to accurately report earnings when it is against his own best interests to do so.