Have low five figures still tied up in FTP so f u Howard. Also doesn't he owe millions in unpaid sports bets/fantasy sports to haralabob and others? Five years later he apologizes? What a guy.

so is it a sign a possible Dnegs apology letter coming in 2021 for the amazing changes pokerstars havent made in 2016 after he gave his word on them?

Aaaaaaaand in after all the sheep whiners complaining about Full Tilt when it was the government those sheep voted into power that caused all of this to happen.

It certainly keeps the focus off the US Government and the lobbyists whose interests they protected by taking down Full Tilt. I'm still waiting to hear their apology for infringing on their citizens' rights.

It strikes me as a pretty genuine apology. I think people are underappreciating how difficult it is to do cash flow management when you have a business that is ramping as quickly as FT was. Their marketing spend had to be through the roof (e.g. DraftKings today) and almost no company at that stage would be operating in the profitable end of the spectrum. The regulatory changes around Black Friday must have completely rocked their business model and all of a sudden you have a few guys with no real executive experience trying to figure out how to operate on a go-forward basis, repay creditors and vendors, and settle accounts. I certainly think there were management mistakes at FT, but fraud? Not at all clear that this was occurring. I've seen CEO's of much much larger enterprises run into the same issue, and it's not easy (that's why they make the big $$$).

I had some money stuck on FT which was returned a couple years ago. I think it's time to bury the hatchet on this one.

Question: politically which would be the best WSOP event for him to re-enter? One Drop given the charity component? High-stakes mixed games so he'll avoid the unwashed masses? Main Event?

LOL at the fools and FTP shills ITT who think the rest of us are as stupid and gullible as they are. "All those bank robberies would not have occurred if the police had not caught the robbers."

FWIW, this apology is pretty much the same as the one he gave previously:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FjHLxTzefs

At 19:00 et. seq.

For your analogy to be correct the guys running the home game would have to be operating a fraudulent money-laundering business on the side out of the same house that catches the attention of the Feds and causes the game to be raided when it otherwise wouldn't have been.

Hi Howard's mom.

I think it's for the traffic it will generate to his site/blog. Could also be why he went easy on Howard, in contrast to his prior statements.

I don't feel it's overly pedantic to point out that your money was not returned. Full Tilt did not return it. You received money from another source (US gov't PS settlement).

So, what would that make you? A shill for sheep?

You people stuck those policy enforcers in office and now you want to blame the poker site for your poor decisions. Go whine somewhere else cry baby.

+ PokerStars (at least pre- Black Friday)

I just watched the entire 03 WSOP. Hearing the interviews with Howard and Jesus kind of pissed me off. It's crazy how those two were gods in the poker community and have fallen this far

Hi guys, we stole hundreds of millions from you but we are sorry. Hope it is all fine now

Also, inb4 Lederer's son pops up on instagram claiming he won 50 million from poker last year...

Hi Howard,

I think your best option would be the Colossus. With 20k+ recreational players, there is a decent chance that no one at your table will have any clue about your involvement with FTP and some may even remember seeing you on TV from back in the day and be excited to play with you.

There is nothing difficult about having a separate bank account for player deposit and withdrawals. That is all they need to do.

I think it's very clear. You seem to be under the impression that overspending within the company was the cause of the shortfall. There is no doubt that the real reason was the directors withdrawing tens of millions and transferring the money to their personal accounts. They were fully aware that there was not enough left in the kitty to cover player funds.

I also think fraud is the wrong word - theft is more accurate.

Well-crafted apology and definitely better than none at all. He admits to unqualified "full responsibility".

However, what he is taking responsibility for is bad business decisions, poor communications and failure to protect deposits. He does not apologise for theft. If he paid out dividends to himself and others knowing those were coming out of of players funds then any true contrition would be accompanied by paying those dividends to players/charity.

Hah, nice.

howard, if you want to take responsibility, why not pay back all the money? why did you negotiate a lower settlement with the DOJ in 2012?
and we're sorry you had to give back your 1965 shelby cobra roadster.

http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-news...int-settlement

While Howard may have reasons to apologize beyond this apology, I'm good with it, He is not the first or last to be in over his head trying to run a business. No one at FT wanted it to turn out like it did. Where things run right before and after Black Friday?, of course not,

Apology accepted Howard, Move forward as best you can....

Hi Everyone:

Well my opinion of Howard is somewhat different. I've known him for over 20 years, and while I'm not friends in a social sense, I have dealt with him business wise going all the way back to 1995. I have always found him to be a person of high integrity which is not that common in poker. With that said, I do consider him to be guilty of carelessness on a large scale when it came to FTP, but I also believe that Howard did not do anything malicious relative to his role at FTP.

A couple more comments. First, the radio interview, which I thought was well received and which undid much of the damage that the PokerNews interview did was of course on The Two Plus PokerCast, and thanks to our PoketCast hosts, Mike and Adam, for doing a great job of interviewing, and thanks to Howard of answering all questions to the best of his ability on our show.

Second, and this is just my opinion, but it's also my experience that attorneys tell you not to say anything and to let them speak for you, and then they say very little. The reason for this should also be obvious, especially when the government is looking at everything that you do. So Howard, doing these interviews at the time he did certainly came with some risk, and this should also explain why his apology seems long overdue to some of you.

All comments welcome.

Best wishes,
Mason

Apologizes for theft without recognizing the theft. As far as I know he received our money via distributions and any apology that doesn't recognize that isn't worth much.

Forbes, 2011:

Federal prosecutors in Manhattan on Tuesday added Ferguson’s name to a civil money laundering complaint, claiming that Full Tilt Poker improperly used funds of online poker players to pay members of its board of directors—including Ferguson and Howard Lederer, a fellow poker champion—$440 million since April 2007.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanva.../#7783dda41d69