[floridagolfer]

From Wednesday's Wall Street Journal:


Online gambling opened with a thud in the first big state to permit it, in part because some major banks won't let their customers use their ************ to play.



A computer screen shows a winner on Internet blackjack in Atlantic City. Associated Press




Revenue from online gambling in New Jersey totaled $8.4 million for the five weeks since its launch in November, the state Division of Gaming Enforcement said Tuesday. That was well off the pace necessary to reach the state's forecast of $1.2 billion total by the end of its fiscal year, which runs through June. The tally was even off track to meet one of the more conservative analyst estimates of a couple of hundred million dollars in revenue for a full year.
"We're not anywhere near declaring success at this point," David Rebuck, New Jersey's top gambling regulator, said before the figure was released. He said the state might get a better picture in a few months. State officials have been in talks with federal agencies, banks, credit-card companies and payment processors to allow more customers to gamble using their ************.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has touted online gambling as a savior for Atlantic City. Gambling revenue in the city plummeted 45% to $2.87 billion last year from its 2006 peak, the weakest performance since 1989, according to the casino regulator. The city has struggled to keep pace with competition from elsewhere in the region. More casinos are planned in New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Maryland.
New Jersey has around 150,000 registered online-gambling accounts with seven casino operators, including Caesars Entertainment Corp. and MGM Resorts International, and their online-gambling partners, Mr. Rebuck said.
The state only allows online gambling by people in New Jersey and requires that the online operator work with a casino that has a physical presence in the state.
Gambling companies are closely watching New Jersey, which is among the first states—and by far the most populous—to allow online gambling in the U.S. Global online-gambling revenue, driven by betting in Europe, last year reached an estimated €25.9 billion ($35.4 billion), or more than five times the gambling revenue of the Las Vegas Strip, according to research firm H2 Gambling Capital.
Besides New Jersey, only Nevada and Delaware allow online gambling in the U.S. That creates headaches for banks, which could face fines and criminal charges if they process illegal transactions.
"Banks are weighing the risks and rewards of allowing this small population to conduct limited transactions that could cause a whole lot of trouble down the road if something goes wrong," said Steve Kenneally, a vice president for regulatory compliance at the American Banking Association. "They have to do the math and see if it's worth it to flip the switch or not," he said.
Robert Shore, an analyst at Union Gaming Research, estimated that half of eligible would-be online gamblers in New Jersey weren't been able to log on because of issues with payment processing or geolocation software, which determines where the gambler is.
Mr. Rebuck said the location issues mostly have been resolved and that payment processing remained the "biggest issue."
Card networks **** Inc. and ********** Inc. will process online-gambling transactions in places where it is legal. But some national U.S. card issuers, including J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and BkofAma Corp., have said they don't allow their customers to use plastic for online gambling. Several regional lenders, including PNC Financial Services Group Inc. KeyCorp and Regions Financial Corp., also said they don't allow customers to use their credit and debit cards for online gambling.
Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp and the TD Bank unit of Toronto-Dominion Bank are among the companies that allow customers to perform online-gambling transactions with their cards.
AMX Co. for more than 10 years has prohibited the use of its cards for gambling online or at physical locations, such as casinos. "Historically, these industries account for disproportionately high levels of card-member credit losses and customer service disputes," a spokeswoman said.
Tobin Prior, the chief executive of Ultimate Gaming, which operates online gambling in Nevada and New Jersey, said his company saw fraud levels "way below" historical levels in the industry because customers of regulated online-gambling companies must submit a lot of information to create accounts.

[jjgold]

Dont think it will be big without ************ and sports betting