Well said.

I agree with this. I was supposed to play the Del Park 1070 Main Event today and had sold 65% of the action on here earlier this week (Tues-Thur). Without the investor money I had to cancel. Putting up the entire buyin with my own money simply wasn't something I could afford. I immediately contacted the investors via PM and posted in the thread.

Then, hearing of what transpired I got another offer from someone unrelated to buy all the action and have me play. While it would have personally behooved me to take the offer I had to decline. It wouldn't be right for me to cancel others action and then play that exact tournament on another deal. As professional poker player keeping a reputation that is above scrutiny is of extraordinary importance. Clear communication and careful consideration of actions in this terrible situation for all of us is key.

What are you even talking about? You were going to play the event today but because you had money online you cancelled and told your investor the money you had online, which you weren't going to use to enter the event" was now hisrisk in your account?

yeh SgtKyle it looks like you should be playing that event for the investors. you made the decision to keep the money online after the event thereby in effect transferring it with your irl account without having to physically do it.

also, the post from imawhale that you agreed with is the exact opposite of what youre doing!? (except for the last bit about playing on your own dime)

The logic And common sense in the past few posts on here is absurd. The money would be frozen no matter whos account its in. No ones on the hook. The money is frozen in the sellers account just as it would be in the buyers account. Action is canceled as the money sent or recieved isnt even liquid (its frozen) When the money becomes unfrozen it gets shipped back to buyer. If it never becomes unfrozen in sellers account then its gone just as it would be if it was still in buyers account. Going to change a bit on everyones diff situation but hopefully both involved are grown up enough amd have enough common sense to get through it. If its simply canceled no one is hurt on either end, no extra risk is assumed by anyone.

Agree accept for this part. But it is essentially the same because when a non-us player invests in a us player through stars or ftp they are taking on the same risk that a us player who plays on those sites. unless there was some agreement of when to cash out beforehand, the sellers money is frozen and should be returned once it thaws.

I strongly disagree in the sole case of events that start (Ed) in the immediate future. If the horse decided to keep the money in his account and not w/d it to pay for the buyin then the action definitely still stands. Ill try to give an example. Acpokerchik played in an event yesterday. She sold out action well prior to the event but for some reason left the money online bc her live bankroll was plenty big enough to buyin from her recent live success. She heads to the casino at 11 am to register for the noon event and starts hearing from everyone about the bombshell yesterday. Does she have the right to a.) pm investors saying she's not playing the event and will return investments when money is unfrozen or even more drastically B.) pm investors with the same info and still buying to the event on her own dime and keep 100% of her own action. My opinion is neither option is appropriate

I had some reservations about posting ITT because I figured someone would come and try to cause controversy in my situation when none exists. I have been in contact with everyone involved and there does not exist any debate or contention.

Additionally, Charders hypothetical scenario of the money being gone forever is not a reality right now. If it becomes one, I will cross that bridge when it happens. However I think it is still very unlikely.

Finally, your notion that because the tournament was the following day and it's clear someone wasn't using that money to enter the event that the tournament needs to be played is one I reject wholeheartedly. I was going to enter the tournament via credit card using PokerTickets and then pay the bill with the Stars funds. Given when the funds were sent there was not enough time to cash out and have it in time to buyin using that cash. However, those funds were still a necessary requirement for me to be able to enter the tournament.

Hypothetical example obv

This guy was playing an event today and decided to keep the money sent to him online. Why all of a sudden does this money become the investors when it is put in Limbo? Why would anyone not assume that when posession of the funds is transferred so is the risk? To tell investors that they are still on the hook for funds when they have transferred those funds to other players andhave no control of them as absurd as well.

No hypotheticals needed....sgt kyle provides the real thing.

SgtKyle's reasoning is fine and makes sense but it basically comes down to whether or not the investors trust the story which is entirely subjective and should probably be left to the investor's themselves until such time as a dispute arises.

Why would it be the investors repsonsability to the funds sgt kyle kept in his account if they were in no way related to buying into the event. So investors ship money to the player...who has no plans on using that money to play in the event....but the investor is at risk for those funds up till the date of the tourney?

I did not decide to keep the money online. Enough time did not pass between when the transfers were sent and when I could have had cashed it out before everything got locked. I got the last transfer on Thursday morning.



I have not said they are 'on the hook' for the funds. I fully expect the money to eventually be made avaliable again and when that happens refunds will be provided.

Without that money available I could not afford to buyin and was forced to cancel. This is not something I wanted to do. And to avoid any possible impropriety I declined another separate offer to play the event.

As I indicated earlier, if the money is 'gone forever' as is the case in charders hypothetical scenario then I will cross that bridge when it happens. I don't expect it to be the case.

Why the HELLLL the horse should be responsable for this ****ing bullsjit?

if he wasnt gonna buyin with his $ online he still loose the part he sold right? so he must pay out of his own pocket

al shares must be cancelled if any buyer isnt able to pay cash before any toerneey starts

if some how the horse his account goes open in like next century, he obv pay back the cancelled shares///////

You are transferring all risk to them, for the funds you never intended to use for the tourney.....that is putting them on the hook sir.

I agree with your situation and agree inique ones like it will come up imawhale. I just hope two grown adults can get through each individual situation with common sense and kindness. As im sure no one is too happy through all of this at the moment

if he was using credit to buyin and then directly using the stars funds to pay off that credit then he never transposes ownership between his funds and the investor funds as his money is never involved.

thats the way i see it BUT i think it sets a bad precedent to look at it subjectively and you need to set a policy which doesn't move for individual circumstances.

easiest and least controversial way to do it is to say - if you play the event, it's on investor's money, if not then just ship back when its thawed - no-one can make any tangible gain and both parties assume some risk.

Tricky situation. I sent a bunch of FTP $ for wsop shares so I would tend to be bias, but still I think it's unreasonable to assume horses should've insta-withdrawn and be on the hook for that money (say in the event FTP $ is seized and never returned).

But for situations like people playing an event this weekend (of which I own no shares afaik so I think I'm unbiased here), I think it's clear horses owe shareholders either equity in the live tourney as agreed upon, or in the event they pass, cash refunds. All FTP/PS funds transferred to horses should've been withdrawn at this point. If horses planned on buying in with what they perceived as "their roll" and leaving the online transfers in FTP/PS accounts, then really what they've done is transferred their live/online cash allocation (i.e. the "their roll" cash becomes investors' shares and the online $$ becomes the horse's personal roll). They should be responsible for bearing the risk that goes with that at this point imo.

Where I would draw the line between instance 1 and 2 is completely arbitrary, but I'd put it at tourneys starting after this weekend.

Definitely not pleased to have to even think about how to handle this, being on both sides of the fence.

Random thought I just came up with... if it is decided that the stakers are the ones to take the risk, should the horses offer to re-sell their pieces to the stakers for no make-up? Then if/when the funds are ever recovered, the horse can take out the original make-up before refunding the balance? Not ideal for either side, but seems a step toward a fairer compromise than simply saying the staker is just plain out of luck.

i agree with charder


(havent read any of the thread yet)

You agree with all his questions? honestly did i miss him taking a side on some issue...

I have another point to bring up...

As a staker, I just had a horse pay me for a share he won two days ago before this all went down. If my money that I sent as a staker is now my risk, shouldn't the money that the horse sent me be his risk? I know that there's no way my horse is going to pay me in cash again and accept a refund if/when his funds ever get released.

Interesting posts above, have myself a quick (hypothetical) example, where i'd like an opinion on (discussed this with a friend and we both disagreed):

lets say tournament is in ~2 weeks, someone recently finished selling all his 70% for ~8k to buyers via online transfers. Now his transfer cash-out history shows that he cashed out 10k of his total online br of 20k just after the last pieces had be sold and paid online (and just received the money in his bank account a couple days ago). Now other 10k is obv locked up with the recent events, and player claims the earlier successfull 10k cash-out was for buying a car and the 8k for the pieces are still in the 10k remaining online roll which he was planning to cash out soon to buy into the live event.

Who should be on the hook and what could be a fair solution to this?

1) money is money-- whether it is cash or digital dollars sitting in bank account in Egypt.

If you opt to transfer a horse money- they are responsible to cash out that money and use it for the buyin of the tournament you purchased action for. It should be treated the same as you handing them cash face to face.

The 10k that is in the horses hand is not his money. It is the backers money. His money is still online.

In the case above,,, the horse is a pos for even attempting to say that the cashout was for a car imo

I dont see how either party should be liable in any given situation. From the dojs perspective online poker is illegal so they have frozen the funds. If I invest $$ in a marijuana dispensary in california (the feds consider this illegal) and the FBI comes in and seizes all the money and inventory,who is liable here? I don't think anyone is. The sad truth is we have been using, what the feds consider illegal accounts for illegal transactions.