End of online casinos?

[monsoon]

Sorry, first posted in the wrong forum...

Whoa... is this the end ?

http://www.reuters.com/news_article....toryID=1522298

I'm just starting out, but is this the last nail in the coffin of online casino?

How is this going to affect the casino portal community?

[VPJunkie]

Thanks, monsoon - I'm deleting the other one, ok?

[aroodt]

The Bill is worthless until the law is passed. This has been going on for years now. One point of concern is that the anti-gambling types are raising the point that casino operators are anonymous, and for all you know you may be supporting terrorist groups that run these casinos.

This may get the attention of congress and push them into taking action against online gambling.

[monsoon]

I noticed yahoo dropped all their CON ads. Interesting comments, I thought it sounded like payments would be blocked as of "now"...

[LineResearch]

This is still a divisive issue and not everyone in Congress agrees that Internet gambling should be regulated, at least in the sense of this Bill. It was actually a surpise that it passed. There are still more steps to go before it can become law ... basically the Senate and the House have to wrangle over the language, there will be some more voting, and then it would have to be signed by the President. These subsequent steps are actually much more significant than what just happened. It would not be unusual to see the Bill die in the process or to see major changes. For those that are interested, following the Bill would actually provide an interesting civics lesson.

Also significant, is an excerpt from the article cited in the first post:

Wall Street analysts have recently slashed their growth estimates for the burgeoning industry. Bear, Stearns Inc. scaled its 2003 revenue estimates down from $6.2 billion to $4.2 billion, while Christensen Capital Advisers has cut its estimate 5 percent, to $6.03 billion.

Industry growth may slow down, but the experts are still predicting growth. This industry is not going away. In the end, like many things, this will probably just become a battle among major interest groups about who is going to control and profit from the industry. The Vegas interests are a major contender. A cynic might suggest that these interests would like to see Internet gambling stalled while they catch up. Smother competition for the US gambler while they get their Internet systems up and running, be it outside the US or restricted to Nevada gamblers, and once accomplished they will be the ones pushing for laws opening the US Internet gambling market. ... if one was a cynic.