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Is there a comprehensive list of MAJOR offshore books that closed without settling players balances?

James D

By James D,
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James D Newbie

James D

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I posted this elsewhere as I am really curious. I was arguing last night with a good friend of mine about the pros and cons of offshore vs a local book. He wonders why I use locals and felt one of his pros was off shore legitimacy and I did not agree. Is there a list, and ideally a back story of the MAJOR books that went under over the years? I have heard of a few on this site over the past 2 years but never paid too much attention. Any info would be appreciated .

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pokerjoe Member

pokerjoe

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Wow, what a memory test this would be. Honestly, maybe your best bet would be to go to Majorwager.com and search. Back when Neteller was open and offshore was fairly new, books were opening and closing pretty quickly. I can remember having more than 30 funded accounts, and others had more than that. Europe and Australia was open to us and hadn't yet degenerated into quick bitch-and-boot books, too (though they were still pretty quick to boot or cripple).

 

Aces Gold may have been the biggest book to go down. Camelot was an interesting story. But I'd say, overall, WSEX's collapse was the most shocking and sad.

 

And anytime I get grumpy about running bad I remind myself of how lucky I am to have never lost a penny from being stiffed offshore (I have been stiffed by locals). Several times I think I must have been one of the last people off the Titanic, cashing out only because Russ or The Devil at MW went to bat for me. Forum owners back then could have some juice with offshores. Hopefully, Kinger and 3Boat get that way here (which is why sports betting really needs one ring to bind them; if there's one truly popular forum, instead of the splintered shit we have now, the players have more juice).

 

It was also the case that having a strong forum presence could get you paid out or a dispute resolved. I got paid once just ahead of a book (maybe BetEurosport? somebody, anyway) giving up (once a book really gives up the ghost on payouts, it's 'fuck everybody' time) because I was "that pokerjoe guy." Also got Bowman's off the fence about an issue that way. I say this without egotism, it was just a reality of the time that if they thought there'd be a public relations problem, they'd do the right thing, but it helped to be a known non-idiot to make that happen because there were also a lot of people creating forum accounts just to sling shit at books. Scammers of all sorts abounded; bad as you might think it is now, it was much, much worse then.

 

Now the big issue, of course, is just money transferring. (It really was cool, BITD, to go to Bank of America and deposit cash into Neteller).

 

But if Bitcoin takes off, we may see a resurgence, who knows. It's possible.

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Bucky Veteran Member

Bucky

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Quite a list. Let's add Dennis Atiyeh and the schmucks at ESB, Champion and Big NASA, and the very entertaining "Pissed off Eddie" who changed names one more time to Aladdins Gold. None of them bother me if they went broke - but the ones that rat holed money and skated on a bad year do bother me. BTW, witf is an F+?

 

But, I think there was a consistent theme in why these books went teats up. They let their lines get stale and sharp money beat them all.

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James D Newbie

James D

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Wow some very knowledgable guys here, thanks for the info. Someone mentioned cascade in the forums before, that was one of the few names I recall reading this past year in the forums. Wasn't there one called tradewinds as well? Also what was ESB? A few smart guys have posted ESB since I posed this question this morning. Thanks guys for the very helpful replies

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Inkwell77 Veteran Member

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BetIslands and BetRevolution are the two most recent ones I have been kinda close to.

 

BetRevolution was weird because they were giving away $50 free plays or something (max cash out $300, iirc). EOG was backing them as well. Maybe Boat or Kinger could give more details.

 

They had great software too. So easy to use.

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groovinmahoovin Newbie

groovinmahoovin

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Cascade, BetOnSports, and WSEX got me the worst. I had numerous accounts that had been bought up by BetOnSports (I remember Millenium, MVP, and BeverlyHillsBookie) so they all went under when BoS went under.

 

Surprised no one mentioned BetPanAm, since that was one of the Shrink's first shit books. He was pumping that one as the next greatest, most reliable book, and talked about how he was constantly going down to Panama and checking out their operations and how he was so impressed by them. Apparently it came out later that his main motivation in going to Panama was so he could have an excuse to see his mistress.

 

I don't remember how major they were, but Blue Marlin got me for a reasonably large amount. They had SIA type lines and promos that were too good to be true, and since I'd only been betting sports seriously for about a year, I wasn't appropriately wary of the "too good to be true" angle. They had some promo that involved free NFL half points and only charged 5 cents extra for buying on or off the 3 or 7, so on a game lined at +2.5 -110 you could get +3.5 -130 via the free half point promo (charging an extra 5c for the on and off the 3.) Tons of books in that era went under for offering buys around the 3 for 20c. SIA was smart enough to have tiny limits, but Blue Marlin was taking rather large limits, I think 2k on NFL sides. I recall winning a couple Blue Marlin sides of scalps right before they went under, so that stung.

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pokerjoe Member

pokerjoe

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That "too good to be true" thing saved me at Aces Gold. I want to say this humbly, because guys got crunched there, but that last Super Bowl line they had was all the tip-off I needed to get out (that, and all the times NFL games landed on 3 that year). Of course if that game had gone the other way there doors might still be open.

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Bucky Veteran Member

Bucky

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Wow some very knowledgable guys here' date=' thanks for the info. Someone mentioned cascade in the forums before, that was one of the few names I recall reading this past year in the forums. Wasn't there one called tradewinds as well? Also what was ESB? A few smart guys have posted ESB since I posed this question this morning. Thanks guys for the very helpful replies[/quote']

 

 

ESB stood for English Sports Betting. I think it was domiciled in Jamaica but really got ran out of Whitehall, Pennsylvania. They were very early in the business and were telephone only for most of their lifespan. That was their theory on legality. They paid good for a long time. Primarily square. Sent a company sportsetting magazine and a cigar if you won.

 

Their demise supposedly had to do with Jamaica retracting satellite equipment and communications equipment which priced them out of the phone business. Some criminal proceedings for bookmaking from America were brought against the Atiyeh brothers which sucked up the players money to be used for legal fees.

 

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theguesser Rockstar

theguesser

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Gibralter was one of my first offshore book's. But that was before they were run by BOS.

 

Yeah. Many of us stayed away from BOS itself, but got screwed when BOS took aver a whole bunch of books. Gibralter was cool. I remember they had -107 and good teaser and parlay odds. And they paid me many times until the F'n Gov't stepped in.

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Dire Straits Member

Dire Straits

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The BetOnSports family which included:

 

Millenium

Gibralter

EasyBets

Jaguar

MVP SportsBook

Beverly Hills Bookie

V Wager

 

Some Other Books that stiffed and folded that haven't been mentioned:

 

Gamblers Avenue

E Winner

Canbet

Fox Betting

YesBet

Synbet

BCN Sports

4Sports Picks

PulseBet

7RedSports

 

7RedSports got me good, Five figures.

 

BetPanam too.

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