March 30, 2007 - WTO rules the
United States is out of compliance with Antigua case
Bloomberg is reporting that
the American ban on gambling has been ruled illegal by the
WTO.
You can read the full article here
To quickly summarize the
article it starts by stating that the United States ban on
Internet Gambling payments is said to be illegal by the World Trade
Organization, which confirms their earlier ruling.
As a result shares of online
gambling companies have risen such as ParyGaming PLC which
is up 16%.
The article goes on to explain
the case and also provides the following quotes.
Today's ruling `` vindicates
all that we have been saying for years about the
discriminatory trade practices of the United States,''
Antiguan Finance Minister Errol Cort said in an e- mailed
statement.
_________
The U.S. agreed that today's
ruling finds it failed to comply with the two-year-old
decision.
Still, the U.S. says the
report allows it to maintain a ban on Internet gambling to
``protect public order and public morals'' as long as it
doesn't discriminate against foreign companies, Gretchen
Hamel, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Trade Representative's
office in Washington, said in an e-mailed statement.
``We are currently reviewing
our options,'' Hamel said.
________
The U.S. ``had an opportunity
to remove the ambiguity'' between legalized betting on
horse racing across state borders and bans on other forms
of gambling, the WTO judges wrote in today's 41-page
decision. ``Instead, rather than take that opportunity,
the U.S. enacted legislation that confirmed that the
ambiguity at the heart of this dispute remains,'' today's
report concludes.
________
``I have no idea at this stage
what measures they could put in place to force America's
hand,'' said Julian Easthope, an analyst of online gaming
stocks at UBS AG in London.
``We're really hoping that as
their options run out and the U.S. sees that they can't
delay any more, they'll enter into negotiations with us,''
Mark Mendel, chief legal counsel to Antigua said in a
telephone interview from the Caribbean.
``The writing is on the wall,
and anyone who takes the time to read the report will
realize it's not true'' that the ban can be justified on
moral grounds, he said.
Income for the 32 registered
online casinos in Antigua and Barbuda has fallen to $130
million a year from $1 billion in 2000, the Antiguan
government says. The country developed online gambling to
boost a tourism-dependent economy after several hurricanes
in the 1990s.
________
This article makes lots of
other great points and is quite an interesting read.
You can read the full article here
