NEW YORK (Fortune) -- If your favorite book happens to be Seabiscuit, you already know the answer to the following question: What are the three legal forms of online gambling in the United States?
The Federal Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, passed in 2006, put the kibosh on all kinds of online gambling, with the exception of fantasy sports, online lotteries, and horse/harness racing. It actually wasn't the betting that was outlawed, but the transfer of money from a bank to an online gambling site. In any event, for online betting houses in the U.S., the party was over -- sort of.
Online gambling in the United States still goes on -- billions of dollars every year -- it just happens via offshore outfits and offshore accounts. Strictly speaking, in ain't legal, but when you have a feeling about a big football game, or you have a poker itch to scratch, well, you'll find a way to scratch it.
Goldman Sachs in a recent research note to investors estimated that online poker and casino games alone could be worth up to $12 billion in the U.S. The white-shoe investment bank also concluded that because of the tax implications alone, the U.S. market is likely to be legalized sooner rather than later.
That is exactly what U.K.-based Betfair, one of the world's largest Internet gambling companies, is betting on. But rather than wait for all forms of gambling to get the green light, it's making its initial push in the U.S. via horseracing. "We want to bring the Facebook generation to the track," says Gerard Cunningham, who heads up Betfair's U.S. operations
Original Article: http://www.fortunechina.com/first/content/2009-07/16/content_21738.htm