With the UIGEA legislation set to go into effect June 1, 2010 we have the first online poker room to pull out of the US market since 2006. Poker Time released the following press statement, in what looks eerily familiar to Party Poker’s and Cryptologic’s statements back in 2006:

“Unfortunately due to circumstances beyond our control, as of 1 June 2010, PokerTime will no longer be able to take bets from players residing in the United States… If you currently have a balance in your account you will need to cash-in prior to 31 May 2010 as PokerTime will not be able to process cash-ins after this date. We apologize for any inconvenience and look forward to welcoming you all back to our poker room should these conditions change.”

No word has come down from the major players in the US market –PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker, Cake Poker Network, Bodog, and the rest—as to their intentions after June 1st, but it appears they will be calling the US government’s bluff. The big question right now is, will the government fire a second a third barrel on those bluffs and start prosecuting banks and payment processors? If this happens, many of the online poker rooms still offering games to US customers may lose millions in seized and frozen funds.

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Tags: Poker Time, UIGEA Legislation

This entry was posted on Monday, May 31st, 2010 at 2:57 pm and is filed under Legal Poker News, US Poker News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.