I'm not sure about this. We'll see if markup of 1.8 is still around in five years.

@1pokershark777
It means that for a 10k event if you want to buy 10% for example, instead of paying $1000 you pay $1800. So he could sell 50% at that rate and then only have to pay $1000 and he has the other 50% of himself.

It's 2018 and people are still shocked that Phil Hellmuth is a giant walking, talking scam?

Honestly, half the people arguing with him probably don't really care this much and are just scoring easy points by getting outraged at the easiest target with the biggest name. Why is Scott Seiver wasting his time in Twitter fights "exposing" Phil "former owner of UB" Hellmuth"?

that stat blows my mind.

WSOP <> to SHRB, but 1.8 might be low


Cuz he's Jelly ?

I dont know but I have a hard time believing that if seiver had an opportunity to get 1.8MU he would say "no, cuz its not fair, I'll just take the 1.1 tyvm"

Lol, and the whole thread is just scamming apologia.

"More power to the fine, bootstrapping cult leaders. If the market demands that blorgons are worth the entirety of your life savings, then that must be their true value. As someone who got to Week 3 of the Coursera course on ECON101, I can confidently say there is no moral gray area here whatsoever."

if you invest in hellmuth you'll go broke sooner or later so it doesnt really matter if he charges mu

Anyone see the movie, The Producers? If you have don’t tell Phil about the movie or next he will be selling 1000% of himself.

My comment would be that if someone is going to sell pieces of themselves at markup, then they should clearly state if they plan on registering late and explain what the starting stack is at the start and what the estimated stack will be when they enter. As far as the markup goes and it being to high, if people are willing to pay it then I don't see how that is his fault. If he continues to not cash in these tournaments, then people will stop buying shares and he will lower the markup or not play. If he is lying about cashing in events like these or inflating numbers, I would call that fraud or a scam.

I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a stake today.

After thinking about it, while I don't know what Seiver's intentions are, it could potentially make sense that he's actually miffed by it. He likely knows a lot of the investors as they're likely to be live high stakes LV fish, so there's many reasons why he could actually be upset by it, be it sincere loyalty to them or PH just drying out his pond or anything in-between.

The issue here is not whether he can find willing people to put up 1.8, as dumb as that is. It's also not whether he wants to light ev on fire by showing up late for a turbo bounty, which is terribly -ev.

The issue here is that the poker community has, to some degree, called out the dishonest* marketing of the attempt to get unsuspecting people to pay 1.8 on the representation that it is a reasonable markup. To the extent that the community has finally (in larger numbers than in the past) called out an absurd markup and stated reasons for it, this is a welcome development and one that will create a better market going forward.

* The marketing is dishonest, in my opinion, because the hollow statement of career ROI is unverified, and potentially unverifiable, and because nobody in the world is 1.8 ever.

lol, beat me to it.

I suspect that scam has been done by quite a few folks over the year re the WSOP ME, and at 1.0.

All the scammer needs to do, if oversold, is plunk down $10K from the proceeds and play reasonably badly to make it look good busting out day one.

those are probably rich businessmen who buy a piece of hellmuth for the lolz

Nothing wrong with the markup, as long as he is upfront about it. Like others have said, let the market figure it out. I do think it is legitimate to call him a jerk for showing up so late.

I'm just curious: What's the average amount that ppl on that site I saw mentioned spend on a share?

It must WSOP time! Stupidity and hilarity already at DEFCON 5

Hellmuth is probably one of my least favorite players. The way he behaves towards other players with zero consequences is deplorable. But there's nothing wrong with him charging a 1.8 markup. As many have already argued, it's a free market and people can choose to participate or not.

The one thing that bothers me is that players are criticizing people for choosing to buy a stake. I'm of the exact opposite opinion. I think it's cool that a 'name player' would make themselves available to the general public. It has to be good for the game. People watch more when they have a vested interest.

Anyone in the thread that has a car payment on a new car for over 36 months is torching money. Poof!

How ‘bout that EV?


Where are all the tweets against Ford and GM for stealing huge chunks of the economy?


Oh. Not outraged? Maybe because adults are free to drive around in their retirement fund if they want to.

Lol, blinding off 20% of stack confirmed GTO strat > taking a nap on the table for the first levels you were gonna be away anyway, but wake up from slumber to shove all-in pre every AA (and maybe x% of AKs)

I'm not 100% but I think back in the day Helmuth said he could fold AA pre if he was put all-in, cause he had such a massive edge he needn't risk busting to a suck out

He's getting clowned on as much for showing up late and basically donating. The mark up just ads to the absurdness when he thinks blinding off chips isn't -EV. He's pretty much acknowledged this was poor form.

Don't even know where to begin with that comparison lol.

Phil Helmuth is a name brand. Got to pay up for name brands, worth it or not.

Comparison is fine - people are free to choose to waste money in a variety of ways, whether it's borrowing for a car or investing at 1.8 in Hellmuth. The person to blame is the person torching their own money, not the person giving them the opportunity to do it.

Yah I guess if the investors are okay knowing he may show up 2 hours late or maybe not even at all then sure. Didn't think he explicitly said that when seeking investment.

If i misread the fine print or lack a basic understanding of financing costs when borrowing for a car then shame on me.

I'm going to assume most of those complaining with voices that are actually heard did not invest.

BTW this really started after PH was slamming what % everyone had of themselves. I get your point but as usual he seems to have brought it upon himself.

One way that Hellmuth could avoid being hypocritical in criticizing players who only have a small piece of themselves is if he is only criticizing those who are swapping pieces with other players in the field, since it could create the incentive to make questionable plays that look like collusion, while still being okay with having backers who aren't playing. (It might also be possible to avoid hypocrisy by only being against players swapping percentages in smaller fields where they have a decent chance of ending up at the same table at some point, but being able to do so in a larger field where that is highly unlikely.)

Have you completely lost your mind?