Home / Poker News December 2011 / Full Tilt Poker Assets Transferred to Bernard Tapie Group
Full Tilt Poker Assets Transferred to Bernard Tapie Group
Posted by: Randy Williams - Fri, 2011-12-16 14:49
The deal long awaited by tens of thousands of poker players world over with fingers crossed, appears to be going ahead as planned. Apparently, an agreement allowing the transfer of assets from Full Tilt Poker to Groupe Bernard Tapie has been reached. The news comes about a month after the French business group has reached an agreement with the DoJ regarding the purchase of forfeited Full Tilt Poker assets.
According to the deal, GBT, the new owner of the brand and software as well as the Full Tilt Poker assets, will repay non-US players, while the DoJ will take it upon itself to refund about $150 million to US players.
The actual deal was pending approval of the majority of Full Tilt shareholders, approval which has apparently been granted now. The decision needed a two thirds majority, but according to experts, obtaining the approval was the easiest move in the sale. The next stage of the deal is FTP forfeiting its assets to the DoJ. Only then will the GBT be able to buy up the said assets.
No statements were yet made regarding the deal by the legal teams of either side.
GBT are by no means idly waiting for the formalities to be completed though. According to some trustworthy sources, the Bernard Tapie group has applied for a Spanish
online poker license, in an obvious move to take advantage of the country’s online gambling laws which go into effect in early 2012. Apparently, the Spanish online gambling market will be a rather busy one: no fewer than 61 companies have thus far applied for licenses.
Ladbrokes, PokerStars, 888 and bwin.party are apparently all among the companies who are eyeing the Spanish market with increasing interest. Obviously, before GBT could launch Full Tilt Poker in Spain, it would have to repay all its existing Spanish players in full.
