Legalities for Poker Affliates

[jowls]

Hi, I've been playing online poker for sometime now and have some friends that are starting to get into it as well. I would like to set up a website and been an affliate but I can't find a clear statement on the legalities of it. Do you have to pay taxes on the money you make? Do you have to have a company before you can become and affliate? I notice on a lot of the sign up forms they ask for a company name? I would like to be able to host a couple of links to poker sites that I play on such as paradise poker and make money from players that sign up and deposit. Any info would be great.

[Bryan]

Hello jowls,

As of right now there is no ban on being an affiliate in the U.S. The Senate stills has to vote this fall on the legalities of online poker in general and that may not even happen, so worrying about something that hasn't been done yet and may or probably won't even pass is simply not worth worrying about it.

As far as taxes... yes you have to pay taxes! Any income earned while you live in the U.S. is taxable income regardless of where it's coming. I would suggest searching through this site to find more on that and also suggest you speak with a qualified accountant to help you set up your "Company" the proper way.

As far as setting up a company... it's typically better to do this simply because it puts you at less risk personally if anything were ever to go wrong. Most people tend to set up an "S Corporation" or "LLC" when starting a small business. Again talk to your accountant about setting this up. It doesn't cost much money and will definitely be worth it in the long run.

As far as getting into the poker affiliate business now... it will be difficult, but definitely give it a try and remember to focus on it like any other job. Keep reading though as much of this site as possible. It's filled with almost everything you can think of in regards to starting as a poker affiliate and alot of it's by very successful ones at that.

Good luck and remember to just be patient at first.

Bryan

[jowls]

Thanks very much for the reply Brian, Yes I'm doing a lot of reading. I will keep researching and see whether or not I'm fully committed.