![Online poker was once big business in the USA and may soon be again](https://gaming.xenite.org/files/2016/08/online-poker.jpg)
With over 2000 online casinos around the world it’s not surprising there is breaking news every day about something. I just learned something really interesting. It appears that USA friendly online casino Bovada is selling its poker room business to Ignition Casino, which is also a USA friendly Website.
Ignition Casino was launched earlier this year and their online promotions are handled by Betting Partners, the same people who have been working with Bodog and Bovada Casinos.
Bodog got into trouble with the US government a few years back over online gambling, especially online poker playing, when the FBI cracked down on a number of online poker rooms. A few people were arrested, a number of websites were seized, and millions of online poker accounts were placed in limbo.
As I understand it, it took about a year to eighteen months for US players to get their money from the various online casinos that were affected by the crackdown. A few of them went out of business. Bodog spun off its US gambling operations to Bovada. And Bovada has been the goto online casino for American players ever since.
Don’t get me wrong. There are dozens, perhaps hundreds of online casinos that accept USA players. Some of them are based in the United States and they only accept players from within their own states because they are licensed by their state gaming commissions. You can find such casinos operating out of Delaware, New Jersey, and Nevada. There may be a couple of other states that now authorize online gambling.
However, Bovada has been the big dog in US online gambling for years. Earlier this year Betting Partners helped launched two new casinos: Ignition Casino and Cafe Casino. We have mentioned both casinos here on Xenite.Org and elsewhere. Ignition made a big splash and was one of the first casinos to offer a huge Welcome Bonus for Bitcoin deposits.
Bitcoin is a strange electronic exchange medium. I don’t like calling it a currency although my business partner and I have accepted some payments in Bitcoin. Bitcoin is traded like a commodity at Foreign Exchange Websites but it is also used to pay for goods and services. Some large retailers accepted Bitcoin for a while but I believe they have been backing off from the market. Every time there is a security breach the value of Bitcoin tumbles. Just recently another major wallet provider was hacked and about $68 million worth of Bitcoin was stolen.
There are, as I write this article, about 15 million Bitcoin in circulation and they are worth over $8.820 Billion in today’s valuation. That seems like a lot of money but it’s not. There can only ever be 21 million Bitcoin in circulation and once the last Bitcoin is mined I’m not sure what will happen. But today a growing number of online casinos accept deposits in Bitcoin and some of them pay you in Bitcoin. Ignition Casino not only accepts deposits in Bitcoin but is offering payouts in Bitcoin. In fact, as I look at their Website they are really pushing Bitcoin. You have to join the casino to see what other options their cashier offers for withdrawals but I suspect that Bitcoin will soon displace other online payment systems.
The news that Bovada has sold its poker operations to Ignition has not yet hit the world. Maybe no one will notice but you can read about what happened to Bovada poker on Holdem Headlines and if you’re really curious you can read about where USA players can join online poker rooms at Holdem Rules.
2016 has been a year filled with changes for online gamblers. I hope these are all good changes. The Bovada to Ignition transition will surely raise some eyebrows but I suspect that the Bitcoin angle plays heavily into this. If Ignition does not act as a currency exchange it should be able to avoid all sorts of legal complications.
And, of course, this is exactly what some people in the United States feared would happen. However, they have allowed Las Vegas billionaire Sheldon Adelson to make up their minds for them about online gambling for way too long. He opposes online gambling on the grounds that it cannot be safely regulated, which is really not true. Although you occasionally come across stories about people being arrested for operating online casinos, the vast majority of the more than 2,000 casinos are licensed and regulated. I think Adelson’s real beef with online gambling is that he isn’t making a profit from it.
He could do himself and millions of other people a favor if he pushed for clear US federal laws that make it easier to gamble. These online casinos would not mind paying taxes if that meant they could access the millions of US online gamblers.