Online Casino and Gambling News: February 2010

The US state that achieved international notoriety by attempting to seize international online gambling domains on protectionist and moral grounds - Kentucky - has just passed a law designed to tax....online gamblers!

Commenting on the recent slew of arrests in raids on Internet gambling operations in China, a director of the government's cyber security bureau warned this week that there was more of the same in the pipeline.

In Victoria, Australia a gambling corruption case originally flagged for the authorites as suspicious by the Betfair online gambling group, moved into a new phase this week as Racing Victoria officials issued two charges against jockey Danny Nikolic.

Georgios A, a 28-year-old Greek player at the Net Entertainment-powered Bet-at-home online casino, is a happy man, having won €3,015,906 and change for a stake of €2.50 whilst playing the Mega Fortune Jackpot progressive around 2 weeks ago.

Friction appears to be building between the land casino industry in Nevada and state legislators scrambling to find a solution to the state's yawning $900 million budget gap, and this time an economically struggling industry is reluctant to bail the state out.

The Hawaii legislature's Committee on Finance has sealed the fate of a proposal to introduce casino gambling on the islands, at least as far as the current sessions are concerned.

William Hill Online, the Internet gambling wing of major British betting group William Hill plc, was a bright spot in an otherwise lacklustre set of results released this week that showed a 9% decline in the group's full year 2009 pre-tax profit to £197.5 million (2008 FY £216.1 million).

Legislation drafted to open up the French online gambling market moved forward another step this week, passing through the French Senate on a first reading with a positive vote of 181 to 140.

The Kansas City Star reports that another suspect in the Kansas City online sports betting probe being conducted by a Grand Jury has pleaded guilty in a federal court. William D. Cammisano Jr. (60), who is alleged to be associated with a local organised crime family, entered a guilty plea this week, admitting that he had operated an illegal online sports betting business between March 1, 2006, and March 31, 2009.

The latest online gambling video slot from Real Time Gaming studios is Golden Lotus, a five-reel and 25 pay-line game with a treasure-filled enchanted oriental garden theme.