The first account belonging to Full Tilt Poker has been unfrozen by the United States Department of Justice. The Irish account belongs to Full Tilt’s co-founder Raymond Bitar, and frees up at least one third of the $100-$150 million still owed to American players. According to eGaming Review’s Full Tilt source, despite this positive event, repayments will not be immediately issued. No date for issuing payments has been confirmed. The freeing up of this particular account, however, is likely to speed up the process considerably.
The account is one of nine Full Tilt accounts in Ireland, out of the 76 named in the Black Friday indictment. Full Tilt has yet to issue any repayments to American players. According to the Full Tilt source, the poker site has been facing unplanned obstacles to unfreezing accounts. He said, “Banks that weren’t even subject to restraining orders started shutting down because they thought ‘we’ve got to be careful, the Americans are after us.’ We actually had to ask the prosecutors to call these banks and tell them they weren’t interested in them.”
Representatives of Bitar have been seeking up to $150 million from investors, aside from financial groups like banks, to help complete refunds to American players. The investors would receive a stake in Full Tilt Poker. To date, these solicitations have been unsuccessful. Full Tilt is still in talks with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York to unfreeze more accounts in Europe.
Last week, Bradley Franzen plead guilty in his money laundering role for Full Tilt. According to the Department of Justice, Franzen was approached by Full Tilt due to a $60 million debt created “by [Full Tilt’s] inability to find a payment processor to process transactions involving US player accounts. The company was facing the shortfall because it continued to credit funds to player accounts despite being unable to actually debit (or “pull”) funds from customers.” The Black Friday seizures, combined with this $60 million backlog, resulted in the millions now owed.
The Full Tilt source commented, “Normally Full Tilt would cover that and take that loss, but because all their banks got shut down there was no way of doing that until recently when the government agreed to unfreeze the [Bank of Ireland] account.” While the financial aspects of these refunds remain complex, the unfreezing of this account is a milestone and likely a sign that prosecutors and Full Tilt are reaching a watershed moment in issuing repayments to American players.