Sports betting and gambling news archive
News
archive 
News
items that were displayed on the Smartgambler front
page during 2004, with the latest material appearing
at the top.
Proceed
to 2005 news archive
Kafelnikov
to switch sports
December
2004
Word has it that Russian tennis star Yevgeny Kafelnikov
has unofficially retired from the ATP tennis circuit
to play professional poker. Kafelnikov, sometimes
criticized as being motivated too much by money during
his tennis career, has already won at least one poker
tournament and is reputed to be a strong player.
Archived
January 2005
Roulette
attack given green light
December
2004 After a 9 month investigation,
Scotland Yard has
determined that two Serbian men and a 'chic' Hungarian
woman who won around 1.3 million pounds playing roulette
over two visits to the Ritz Hotel Casino have not
broken any law and are free to leave the country with
their winnings. The mechanical attack involved using
a laser device to track the position and speed of
the ball and rate of decay, calculating the most probable
landing point with a microprocessor which then displayed
its recommendations via a mobile phone. Because the
attack did not interfere with the roulette mechanism
and merely observed and calculated, it was deemed
not have broken any specific law. Similar attacks
in other countries have not necessarily enjoyed the
same legal interpretation, so the team picked their
target well.
Archived
January 2005
Betfair
blunders on Aussie Idol
November
2004 English based betting exchange Betfair is
recovering from a red faced episode in which they
failed to close betting on the final result of popular
TV talent show Australian Idol until approximately
one hour after the result was known. In the know bettors
had a field day backing winner Casey Donovan at generous
odds after the judges' verdict had already been delivered.
Betfair has agreed to reverse all bets placed after
the result was known, something made possible by their
betting software system which records when every bet
is made and between which parties. Presumably Betfair
will have to wear the losses on any amounts already
paid to bettors who have since withdrawn the money
and closed their accounts.
Archived
December 2004
Western
Australian government enforces betting ad ban
November
2004 A major racing publication
has been contacted by the WA department of Racing,
Gaming and Liquor and told that it was illegal for
them to continue publishing ads for racing services
not registered in WA if their publication was sold
in WA. They were also advised that they could not
carry ads for sites that promoted betting sites not
registered in WA. This is an interesting development
in light of the constitutional right to free trade
between the States and will no doubt be subject to
scrutiny by constitutional experts in the legal industry.
Archived
November 2004
Betcorp
flags sale of Sportsbet Australia
September
2004 ASX listed online gaming
company Betcorp Ltd has flagged its intention to sell
subsidiary Sportsbet Australia. Betcorp, who recently
appointed two new directors after a boardroom shake
up, will concentrate on their Northern Territory and
Antiguan operations and will close their Sydney office.
After painting a glowing picture of their Sportsbet
Australia division in a recent report to shareholders,
Betcorp subsequently dismissed the soon to be sold
subsidiary as 'immaterial' to their overall position.
Archived
November 2004
Turmoil
at Betcorp
August
2004 ASX
listed multinational online bookmaker and casino owner
Betcorp Ltd has been rocked by three of its four directors
resigning. Following on from a disappointing loss
reported recently after a profit in the corresponding
period last year, Betcorp senior management started
falling on their swords right left and centre. The
company has sought and received a trading halt pending
the appointment of a new CEO and is said to be undergoing
due diligence by a possible new owner. All its betting
operations appear to be functioning normally.
Archived
September 2004
IAS
/ Canbet merger
August
2004 Call it a merger or call it a takeover, Mark
Read's listed IAS Bet is acquiring all the capital
of Canbet Ltd in a deal that combines the operations
of two leading online bookmaking firms. In a statement
released to the ASX on August 6th 2004, the companies
said that shared aims for profit growth and expansion
in foreign markets and certain complementarities in
their operations (Canbet currently does not offer
horse racing), made the merger a good fit. The mostly
scrip deal comes despite a struggling IAS share price
in recent months, perceived as reflecting market concerns
over court action pertaining to a possible multi million
dollar payout over an IAS client who lost the sum
to the bookmaker after embezzling it from his employer
(a leading bank) over a lengthy period of time.
Archived
September 2004
Olympic
takes action.
July
2004 Spotted
by one of our members on the website of major bookmaker,
Olympic.
7/20/2004 3:00 PM
Sargis Sargsian vs Gregory Carraz
There will be no betting on this match due to Sargsian
being of Unsavoury Character
Archived
August 2004
Government
decides against regulating betting exchanges.
July
2004 The
federal government decision not to regulate has drawn
predictable responses from most quarters, with competitors
to the exchanges mostly pushing the line that racing
will now become more corrupt. Breaking ranks with
industry vested interests was bookmaker Michael Eskander,
whose philosophical reaction to the news will earn
him fans amongst the group with most to gain from
the increased competition that betting exchanges introduce,
the punting public.
Archived
August 2004
Victorian
crackdown on casino money laundering
June 2004 Following
the flurry of publicity about criminal activity in the state, the Victorian
government has asked Melbourne's Crown Casino to stop alleged underworld kingpin
Antonios Mokbel and his brothers from gambling at the casino. Similar requests
in the past have seen a number of alleged underworld figures prevented from
using Crown's gambling facilities. Crown spokesperson Gary O'Neill said the
casino would co-operate with authorities on such requests.
Archived July
2004
Dominican keno
scam challenged
June
2004 News
has come through that a Mr Carl Leyva has filed criminal fraud charges and a
civil law suit against the Hotel Melia and Diamante Casino. The owner, Mon Elias,
one of the most powerful men in the Dominican Republic, is also named in the
suit. Mr Leyva allegedly lost US $20,000 to the operation which is described
in the
Scams section of this website.
Archived July
2004
IAS
moves into betting exchange market
April 2004
Mark Read's listed bookmaking company International All Sports has announced
the acquisition of 50% of Gibraltar based Internet Betting Company PLC which
operates betting exchange Swapbets.com. Sources have indicated that IAS would
like to get a license to operate their own betting exchange in Australia but
it is still too early to know whether such licenses will be issued.
Archived May
2004
Bookmakers
Association CEO lashes exchanges again.
March
2004. Tim Ryan, well known scribe from the Australian horse racing industry,
has taken aim at betting exchanges again in a March 12th article in the Sydney
Morning Herald. Ryan has switched the focus of his attacks to the unique facility
on betting exchanges of 'laying' particular participants in a sporting event,
or betting on them not to win.
Ryan's argument
is that this is likely to encourage corruption that could bring the sports in
question into disrepute and ultimately deter punters from betting on them at
all. Smartgambler sees this line of reasoning as a more enduring argument than
previous attempts to discredit exchanges, such as the controversial rationale
that they contribute nothing to the sports they make their business from.
Archived April
2004.
More
denial of service attacks on Bookies.
March
2004. SportOdds,
Canbet and other high profile bookmakers are amongst the latest victims of the
spate of denial of service attacks attributed to East European and Russian criminal
extortionists.
Interpol
is believed to be working on the problem, but the inability of international
law enforcement to stop the so called Nigerian scams after so much time raises
questions about the efficacy of authorities against this kind of elusive target.
Archived
March 2004.
Russian
mafia strikes again?
Febuary
2004. Another
denial of service attack that crashed the server of online bookie Gamebookers
in mid February bears all the hallmarks of the rash of extortion attempts that
have been widely attributed to Russian organised crime. The theory is that rather
than allow their sites to be shut down over the lucrative weekend betting period
that major online bookies will pay extortion money to criminal gangs. Clearly
some companies have not been willing to co-operate. At this rate bookies will
end up as objects of sympathy, an unfamiliar role!
Archived
March 2004.
Criminal
high rollers cause problem for Aussie bookies
January
2004. In
a bizarre case of synchronicity, two major Australian online sports betting
and racing bookmakers have been caught up in separate scandals involving high
roller embezzlers who gambled away the proceeds of crime in excessively large
wagers.
Mark
Read's IASbet was forced to make an announcement to the Australian stock exchange
after its shares were temporarily suspended following the arrest of a high rolling
embezzler who used the Darwin based bookmaker to lose millions of dollars of
stolen money. IAS claim to have acted correctly at all times, but possible legal
action to recover some or all of the lost money sent IAS shares tumbling.
Meanwhile,
the Australian Supreme Court has found that AUD $2.78 million out of AUD $11.5
million stolen and gambled by another dishonest employee must be repaid by another
Darwin based bookmaker, Sportingbet Australia. The company is appealing the
decision.
In
both cases the legal issues revolve around the duty of care on the part of bookies
to note any suspicious behaviour on the part of clients that may indicate money
laundering activities or the use of stolen money.
Archived
March 2004
Industry
mergers and takeovers continue
October
2003. Sydney based SportOdds group, the sports betting vehicle of Con and Peter
Kafataris, has purchased Centrebet from Jupiters Limited in a further rationalisation
of the Australian gaming sector.
Archived January
2004
Mafia
linked to bookie problems
October 2003. Canbet and other major online betting
websites have been subjected to a spate of denial of service attacks, which
have severely disrupted services on occasion. Rumours have surfaced that the
attacks are the work of a Russian organised crime syndicate attempting to extract
money from online bookmakers
in a cyber equivalent of the old style protection rackets.
Archived January
2004
Proceed
to 2005 news archive
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