The active week for Absolute Poker continues. On Tuesday, the member of the CEREUS Network announced that it, along with sister site UB, has come to an agreement with the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, a preliminary step in hopefully getting frozen funds back into U.S. players’ bank accounts. Absolute and UB were two of the sites hit hard, along with PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker, in the April 15th U.S. Department of Justice indictments of eleven people involved in online poker, including Absolute principals Scott Tom and Brent Beckley.
As a result of the indictments, the DOJ seized the domain names AbsolutePoker.com, UB.com, and UltimateBet.com, and froze player funds. The poker rooms stopped accepting U.S. customers, though both Absolute and UB still allow Americans who were already customers to play, unlike PokerStars and Full Tilt, both of which immediately and completely cut off U.S. players. Existing U.S. customers of Absolute and UB are not concerned with whether or not they can still play on the sites, as most will eventually leave or be banned, but rather are worried about getting their funds back.
While certainly not the only reason for the agreement, getting funds back into the players’ hands was a major impetus. Tuesday’s press release reads, in part:
“Absolute Poker has reached an agreement with the United States Attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York (“SDNY”). Under the agreement, the US Attorney’s Office has agreed to provide all necessary assurances that third parties may work with Absolute Poker to facilitate the return of funds, currently held by third party processors, to players located in the US. This provision is an important step to returning US player funds.”
While this is good news for players, there is still work to be done. Absolute Poker says that there are still “several legal issues” with which to deal before funds can be released. Thus, no money will be flowing back to the States just yet.
In the press release, a spokesperson added:
“Today’s signing of the agreement with the DOJ is an important step towards the safe and efficient return of funds to our US players. We can now move as expeditiously as possible to collect player monies from third party processors as a prelude to establishing proper mechanisms for the return of funds to our US players. As previously announced, we have already taken specific actions to exit the US market by closing our US-facing operations. Blank Rome LLP will continue to engage in discussions with the SDNY in order to complete the necessary agreements for the final transfer of frozen fund balances to our US players.”
Unlike in the PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker agreements with the DOJ, Absolute Poker’s agreement does not include the reinstatement of its .com domain names.
The past week has been hectic for Absolute Poker, UB, and their parent company, Blanca Games. On May 5th, Blanca Games announced that it was releasing almost its entire workforce, retaining just a few employees to focus on its ongoing non-U.S. Operations. The very next day, Costa Rican law enforcement agents raided the offices of Innovative Data Solutions, the customer service center for both Absolute Poker and UB, apparently looking for three executives involved with the companies. Then on Monday, all U.S.-based sponsored pros of UB and Absolute, including Joe Sebok, Tiffany Michelle, and Eric “basebaldy” Baldwin, were let go. Tuesday’s news was the first for Absolute Poker since “Black Friday” that involved anything remotely positive.
PokerStars, which still ranks as the largest online poker room in the world despite losing its U.S. players, began processing cashouts to Americans during the final week of April. Full Tilt Poker has yet to begin.
