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Written by Marcus | Thursday, November 26th, 2009
It has recently been brought to the attention of the media that the House Financial Services Committee will hold a hearing for the purposes of discussing two crucial pieces of legislature regarding the UIGEA. The conference will be held December 3rd, 2009 at 10:00 a.m. ET, and the hearing will be broadcast over the web at the official Committee website. The meeting, which will take place in the Rayburn House Office Building will address two items that have been introduced by Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts) last May, the Reasonable Prudence in Regulation Act (HR 2266) and the Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection, and Enforcement Act (HR 2267).
On the 1st of December, two days before the hearing is scheduled to take place, according to the terms of the midnight rules that were signed off on by the former Bush administration, the US financial services industry must adhere to the terms set forth by the UIGEA. The Poker Players Alliance (PPA) has been expecting this meeting and is happy to see it convene so soon, though not in time to intercept the December 1st deadline. While the hearings are believed to only be informative discussions about the bills, HR2266 would delay the UIGEA regulations for another year, setting the date to comply by on December 1st, 2010. This bill has lots of support from both Republicans and Democrats, including Republican Ron Paul from Texas, Steve Cohen, Democrat from Tennessee, Jim McDermott, Democrat from Washington, and Robert Wexler, Democrat from Florida, 53 co-sponsors, to be exact.
The other bill, HR2267, has 63 supporters and outlines a full-licensed and regulated framework for online poker and Internet gambling operators to take real money bets legally from US players. McDermott added a companion bill last May, HR2268, that would tax the gambling operators 2% on all deposits. Recent research done by the Joint Committee on Taxation estimated the US online gambling market to be worth $42 billion for the next 10 years.
As of now though, there is less than one week for the online gambling industry to prepare for the repercussions that the UIGEA’s stipulations will now put on payment processors that facilitate online gambling cash transactions. This hearing will be the first real action toward the regulation of online gambling and may be the first in a long line of hearings, but it’s a start nonetheless.
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Written by Marcus · Filed Under news · |
