Harrah's delivers another blow....
 

Harrah's compliance board decided yesterday that ZERO advertising would be allowed from any poker site accepting US players.

That means no .net, no nothing from the likes of Fulltilt, Pokerstars, etc...

Foreign sites that don't allow US players will be able to advertise as usual, and be able to register as many players as they want.

Now, we've all read about no poker sites "who've made money illegally" being able to register players. That's been the policy for several years. In the past, affidavit's were signed by third parties (usually some type of ad agency working for Pokerstars or whoever) that said none of the money was from illegal sources.

Harrah's has not made any official comment that anything from the past will change.

BUT, considering this latest move is even more restrictive than what the DOJ has imposed on the Travel Channel and others, it sures seems like Harrahs is going to make it pretty tough on Pokerstars and others.

Do you have a credible source regarding this information? Or is this yet another rumor?

If it's from ChiefOfficer it's credible

Thanks joeker.

A couple people on this board know who I am, but I don't make it public knowledge just so my opinions (sometimes intense :) and my leaks..sometimes helpful) don't reflect on who I work for.

This is 100% information I would be privy to, and you can be assured I hate this stance by Harrahs.

It seems like everyday I come to work these days....I make less money than I did the day before...lol

Oh well. Maybe someone can talk Harrahs out of it, or I guess there's some very slim chance officers at Harrahs overrule the compliance board, but I highly doubt it.

Unless something changes pretty quickly in DC, I think this is going to be the stance of Harrahs for the time being.

Gambling911 or someone will probably have a story about it sometime soon.....although Harrahs may not make an official statement about it for a while.....so their WSOP management team can figure out how in the heck they're going to make money.

Just total speculation on my part here.....

But I could see a fallout at Harrahs over this. A guy like Jeffery Polluck was brought in to make the WSOP take off. Jeffery has had some high ranking positions in the past (with the NHL I believe) and has a brother who is pretty high up with.....I think the NHL....not 100% positive on that.

But, my point is....Jeffery's hands are pretty tied if this is the stance Harrahs is going to take. Jeffery is really hell bent on making the WSOP Circuit events bigger and better. That included more involvement from the online sites as well as possibly getting a huge title sponsor of the tour (i.e like Fulltilt)

Now Jeffery can't do any of that.

The revenue of the WSOP will take a huge hit. Not huge to the grand scheme of things at Harrahs, but huge to the management team of the WSOP.

If I was Jeffery, and this is the stance Harrah's is going to take, I'd pack it up and find another job...which he could easily do.

Now, if Jeffery knows about some grand scheme that involves Harrahs taking over the online poker world.....then I'd stick around :).......I don't know any such plan..before someone even asks :)

Thanks for the reporting Chief, you are definately a GREAT asset to this board.

And yes if it comes from chiefofficer it is credible. (doesn't mean we still can't disagree once in a while though) :)

lol, sorry Jeremy, I was in a bad mood last week....it's hard not to be in this environment.

I appologize for jumping down your throat about the other Harrahs post. End the end, that article you posted may be correct, but I am 100% positive even Harrahs is not sure what they are going to do. I can also say there is disagreement between people even at Harrahs.

One group at Harrahs did a deal for FTP to be on the felt for the WSOP, then the compliance board came back and said no deal. Even people at Harrahs are pissed as hell about the entire situation.

It does seem just ridiculous that Harrahs would accept advertising dollars from a company like Ladbrokes but not any sites where american players can play online.

Make it either all or none. All this does is add fuel to the already exsisting fire. The satellite issue I suppose I could understand why they wouldn't allow U.S. online qualifiers. But to not accept advertising dollars based on the rooms internal policy is a bad decision in my opinion.

Hey Harrahs execs........ you guy are Las Vegas, not the Department of Justice. If I was shareholder I would be pissed to see such massive advertising dollars being turned away.

The current shareholder's don't care; they are getting a fixed purchase price per share (assuming the pending private equity deal goes through). Whenever you have management running a company in a pending sale situation, they always make the "safe" choice and don't do anything that could risk the deal not closing. It throws priorities out of whack because missing out on a bit of profit is much less important than taking on any additional risk (or the perception of risk).

Very true, thanks.

Harrah's isn't making any of the decisions. Don't blame or congratualte them. Gaming decides all this stuff.