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PartyGaming released it’s latest financials recently and everyone was expecting to hear their opinion of PokerStars contuing to operate in the US.  Mitch Garber, CEO of PartyGaming, said that while PokerStars might be an issue in the near term but after the banks have backed out of online gaming there would be significant problems at PokerStars.  Garber’s opinion is that Party will have weathered the storm long before Stars, and will be better positioned to recover.

This all presumes that the banks will come up with effective ways of blocking gambling traffic and it is not clear how they will do that.  One would think that Garber has access to high-level people at major banks and he is speaking from experience.  But at the same time the banks have said it will be difficult or impossible to block gambling transactions.

Party’s forecasts were pretty bleak, as were Sportingbet’s who also released financials this week.

Betcorp, an AIM-listed company, announced it will sell its gaming operations and turn the proceeds over to its shareholders following the passing of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA).  PartyGaming fell 1.5p to 27.5p on the back of the announcement. Sportingbet edged down 4p to 40p.  888 Holdings was also down 3.25p to 93p.

PokerPlayerNewspaper.com is reporting that the 2007 WSOP “may not” allow online qualifiers for the 2007 WSOP. This is in response to the UIGEA, and a pretty early response at that. Surely they will continue to allow non-US players in the WSOP. Online poker is still legal for most non-US players, so an outright ban on online qualifiers is strange considering the tens of millions they stand to lose in buy-ins.