I found this at Bet2gamble.com and thought it was interesting. Is this a person with a agenda? Anybody know this guy? Not trying to start any trouble just thought it was interesting..
Is BetPanAm Safe?
By Parlaythis
September 17th, 2003
How sharp was Monty?
So sharp that when he opened his new sportsbook and started taking baseball wagers, Pinnacle - the graveyard where losing sides of scalps go to die - shamelessly cloned his overnight lines to the penny.
In the 1990's, when he ran the book now known as CRIS, Monty never backed away from any player. Whenever a customer laid a big bet, Monty knew the reason. He knew the middlers and scalpers. A select group of syndicates and originators, like Billy Walters and Billy Baxter, were known as "snappers," because when they called, clerks were required to raise their hands above their heads and snap their fingers. This alerted other bet-takers to momentarily stop giving out lines, protecting CRIS from getting double popped at the same price by additional beards or followers before Monty could adjust his odds. By contrast, certain squares and whales inhabited a kind of pay-no-mind list; with clerks specifically instructed not to call out their action no matter how large. Make a mistake that allowed a wiseguy to get so much as an extra half-point, and Monty, described by one clerk as "a big scary guy," would jump in your face, veins bulging out of his thick bull neck. "That's twenty thousand dollars you just f'n cost me," he'd scream.
Monty's own book, Caribi, debuted on the Don Best service on January 23, 2000. Under Monty, CRIS' line had appeared on the screen as "Caribi" because it was considered the Caribbean line; the one everybody followed. Taking the name with him for his new venture ensured that all would know that the numbers listed under "Caribi" were Monty's numbers.
Its exclusive agreement to carry CRIS' lines made Don Best. The company was so grateful to Monty that it kept Caribi on its Premium Service even as the book ran into trouble early in football season, all the way up to the time Caribi pulled the plug for good on June 2, 2001.
Caribi hit an iceberg while booking over its head during what's supposed to be the most lucrative part of the year. It started slow paying big credit customers in September. In December, it announced a "complete restructuring," by then buried in debt on transfers to other books, and behind in its payments to post-up players as well.
Monty was one of the most respected figures in the industry when he started Caribi - a far cry from the image with which he emerged of a discredited cokehead-pervert who lusted after teen-age transvestite hookers.
Some critics were quick to blame his personal vices for Caribi's demise. Imagine that, a Costa Rican bookie heavily into drugs and whores - I'm shocked. But it's clear that the reputation of offshore bookmaking as a difficult business for a new book to break into remained intact, although Monty's reputation didn't.
The Dunes was another heavily hyped newcomer at the beginning of the 2000 baseball season. Like BetPanAm, this summer's celebrated new arrival, Dunes opened for telephone wagers before its website was ready to accept Internet bets.
Dunes offered in-progress betting and 25% sign-up bonuses and quickly gained a place on Bettorsworld, then the web's premier sports betting forum. Bettorsworld co-owner Jeff put the book on his once prestigious "list" of recommended sportsbooks. On April 6, 2000, he gushed, "I can tell you that the people doing the bookmaking have been in the bookmaking biz for many years and are as sharp as they come."
Sound familiar?
Dunes maintained a strong forum presence with the help of its spokesperson, the ubiquitous Samantha. She flirted with customers, answered their questions, wrote articles, and did everything but lick her own nipples and claim to look like Halle Berry.
As soon as the New Year rolled around, Samantha announced "a complete reorganization" for the Dunes. In a bizarre, rambling statement, she denied financial problems and instead blamed the book's rash of slow pays on mysterious Russian hackers. In reality, Dunes' woes probably had more to do with its owners' gambling habits and questionable integrity.
Shortly thereafter, with the original owners supposedly gone, but Samantha staying put, Dunes tried to rebound. It managed to pay out sporadically, but died a lingering death, succumbing by January 2002.
But the book that most resembled PanAm was the original Direcbet.
With a management team comprised of Pinnacle expatriates, most of who teamed earlier as executives of Darwin-based DAS (now BetAustralia), Direcbet copied Pinnacle's low-juice model from the outset. Like its giant Curacao neighbor, Direcbet actively discouraged phone wagers to cut costs. Initially, the book imposed a $2000 minimum on telephone wagers.
They also milked a much-ballyhooed English gaming license for all it was worth. Actually, the license belonged to a Direcbet board member, who maintained it long after selling a small 8-shop chain of British brick-and-mortar sportsbooks.
Naturally, sports betting "watchdog" sites couldn't get enough.
Neither could their posters. Testimonials poured forth in a torrent.
One friend of the book's top brass exulted, "You won't go wrong there, they have got some serious money behind them, plus they know the pitfalls of the game and what they'd do better than their previous employers."
And how about this gem from web-tout "Betting Prophets," posted on March 25, 2001, just weeks after Direcbet's launch: "if AJ (Thompson, IT director) or Matt (Keats, marketing director) tells who is THE MONEY behind Direcbet you would NEVER worry about them being in ANY financial difficulty."
As the 2001 baseball season wore on, Direcbet progressively ratcheted its reduced juice upward and lowered the breakpoint for departure from its minimum 8-cent straddles. Bloodied by wiseguys, the book dramatically slashed limits before suddenly reneging on its heavily promoted -105 offer on NFL sides. Instead, on September 5, Direcbet introduced a "triple touchdown (21%) bonus," which also included a promised rebate on wager amounts.
By now, the book was in serious trouble. Already a slow pay, though not widely known as such, reports began to surface of Direcbet demanding matching deposits on the proceeds from promotional "free accounts" and denying withdrawals under various pretexts. The book took to hiding in plain sight, as it stopped answering e-mails or responding to "live help," and slinked away from the forums. On September 26, AJ Thompson was forced to acknowledge the slow pay situation in an official statement.
On September 29, Bettorsworld's Jeff tried to sound optimistic about the new book he welcomed as an advertiser almost 7 months earlier: "I believe the players at direcbet will be ok. If they can't pay, someone in Curacao is likely to step in and help. They have a reputation (curacao) to uphold. They don't want deadbeats over there."
But, as the Curacao books sat on their hands, it was Costa Rica-based Pariaction that actually saved the day, announcing a tentative agreement to acquire the floundering Direcbet on October 23, 2001.
Now, almost 2 years later, BetPanAm attempts to accomplish what the original Direcbet couldn't - survive as a rookie sportsbook in a now much more crowded reduced-juice niche.
In a carefully orchestrated marketing campaign beginning well before its inception, BetPanAm has been the subject of numerous laudatory articles and press releases. One story even made the ludicrous assertion that Panama, where BetPanAm claims to be the first officially licensed sportsbook, is a G7 nation.
At his "Prescription" website, where PanAm is an advertiser, and where paid moderators and shills sit at rapt attention like an infomercial audience ready to applaud on cue, "The Shrink" penned a puff piece entitled, "Here Comes Panama." On BetPanAm's home page, a blurb above a link to Shrink's article declares, "The therx.com recently visited us to check out our establishment and fact-dig."
That's funny, because I've never heard Anna Nicole Smith referred to as a "fact-digger."
I decided to find out if BetPanAm would submit its operation and business strategy to genuine critical scrutiny. On August 25, at his request, I e-mailed the following list of proposed interview questions to PanAm's Marty Monroe:
1) How will BetPanAm differ from from previous much-hyped start-ups like Caribi, Dunes or Direcbet -- the latter of which also embraced the low-juice model and fielded a management team drawn from respected books, including Pinnacle?
2) How do you expect to compete with entrenched rivals without giving away the store in bonuses or line value?
3) How do you expect to cope initially with a disproportionate share of wiseguys and sharp players -- can you, and, as a new book, won't you have to?
4) When do you expect to become profitable, and how long are you prepared to operate without a profit?
5) Do the terms of your license not allow you to have credit customers?
a) Does a book new to post-up need a preexisting credit base to survive while attempting to gain a foothold in a saturated market?
6) Will your owners function as "backers," sending funds as needed, or do you have all the cash up front required to operate and pay winners for the foreseeable future?
a) If you're adequately funded, why not escrow client balances or place them in a verified trust account like All World?
7) Can you please explain the licensing system in Panama, and do you hold a "master license"?
8) Why should the "master license" concept work better in Panama than it has in Curacao?
9) Didn't you have to post a $500,000 bond as a condition of licensing, and how much of that $500k did BetPanAm put up in actual cash?
10) Is the $500k strictly in case of a dispute upheld in a customer's favor?
a) What kinds of disputes and what's the protocol for resolution?
b) How long is it expected to take to formally resolve a dispute?
11) Why won't the Panamanian government give up bookies and customer and banking records to the U.S.?
12) Didn't a couple of books open in Panama as early as the mid-90's, only to eventually have the army barge in and demand protection money and seize cash?
a) Why won't you need to worry about such a scenario?
13) Will Panamanian banks have to risk their correspondent relationships with U.S. banks to continue doing business with you, and would they be willing to do so?
14) Can you please confirm the background information made public regarding your managers? As I understand, it's Richard Long, managing director, formerly with Betmaker and Sportingbet; Scotty King, player development, formerly with Pinnacle; and you, Marty Monroe, marketing director, formerly of Galaxy and Royal.
15-16) Author's note: Questions 15 & 16 inquired about some specific sports offerings and their odds.
17) Do you provide one free monthly withdrawal, and is that per calendar month, like Pinnacle?
a) Does that include Western Union?
b) If so, won't that get expensive?
After forwarding the above queries, I had no further contact with Marty.
Of course, it doesn't matter whether BetPanAm chooses to respond to the inquiries of a lone Internet columnist, but the book has continuously declined to address any substantive issues relating to its viability or the safety of player funds.
Instead, we get only hollow assurances from the usual cast of paid promoters and unrepentant shills, blithely oblivious to their dismal record of leading the lambs to slaughter.
Last year was not particularly kind to "The Shrink" in his role of self-appointed "watchdog," with Prescription-endorsed bookmakers like BetMega stiffing gamblers and vanishing faster than threads that prove too embarrassing to the Rx or its advertisers.
On September 19, 2001, Shrink rolled out the welcome mat for GrandMaster Sports: "They are clearly one top notch sports book that we highly endorse."
On July 2, 2002, a headline in the Rx Offshore forum read, "Grandmaster Sports Has Disappeared."
After warning bettors away from NAB on February 7, 2002 because its principals allegedly cheated Rio in the Skybook sale, Shrink took aboard NAB's newly spun off post-up division, New Age Bets, on August 30. By October, they were roadkill.
WagersParadise, the upstart apparently run out of a back room at Buckeye Sports by one guy, joined the Rx on November 11 and promptly assumed sponsorship - for participants willing to send a deposit, naturally - of a football contest previously bankrolled by NAB. You can guess what happened next.
"Krackman," like his friend Shrink, emerged from the NAB debacle with a tarnished image. On October 9, he praised the book on 2 different forums with the identical statement, "Just want to let you guys know I have cracked this place as of late and have received every payout with ease and zero problems. Good book with some good incentives."
When NAB was exposed as broke less than a week later, Krackman, known as a well-connected, large bettor, quickly fell under suspicion. Though the $40,000 or more he claims to have lost could be construed as providing ample motive, no one has divulged any tangible proof that Krackman acted to lure the unsuspecting into bailing him out, an allegation he vehemently denies. If not, his untimely twin posts combined with the monetary loss to make him an undeserving double loser.
Undaunted by his similar lack of prescience regarding Direcbet, Betting Prophets, on February 25, 2002, famously remarked, "YOU'RE MONEY IS SAFE at Camelot and I would wager my kids on that pal."
Less than 2 weeks later, the troubled sportsbook turned out the lights. Krackman, who subsequently disclosed that Markdel, who ran Camelot, advised him to grab $1500 from the book's Neteller account before it was too late, and BP both supported Markdel to the end and beyond.
Nobody knows if BetPanAm will meet the same fate, but although people always believe they'll get out in time, rest assured that the insiders have better information than you, and will head straight to the front of the queue if the ship starts sinking.
No evidence exists that the trio of Krackman, Shrink and Betting Prophets can predict which new books will survive. Because they all own websites on which PanAm pays to advertise, they have little incentive to even try.
Still, I would have recommended that anyone contemplating signing up with PanAm do so through Krackman's Bettors Pub site because he briefly promised to guarantee post-up funds to a maximum of $1000 per player, an acknowledgement of the perceived risk associated with a new book. However, he informed me that he abandoned the plan because of legal concerns, so that possible extra layer of protection is gone.
The case for BetPanAm rests on reduced juice, experienced management, fast payouts, and licensure and regulation by a hopefully hospitable Panamanian government.
We already have other regulated or well-established books charging vig comparable to, or even lower than PanAm, including Canbet, Betworks, BetAustralia, Hollywood, IIS and Pinnacle.
We've seen that management's experience and background take a back seat when it comes to new sportsbooks.
BetPanAm was touted as having the fastest payouts in the industry a month before its August 15 opening. Its exclusive "FlexCard" supposedly makes this possible. But Neteller and PrePaidATM both offer debit cards. Aces Gold, Camelot and NAB all paid fast too before they ran out of money.
Panama is a nice place if you're a mosquito. But it remains unproven as a sportsbook jurisdiction.
Antigua was supposed to regulate the books. But its Directorate of Offshore Gaming didn't lift a finger to help players stiffed by Eddie Hadeed when it closed his new book, Alladin's Gold, in March of last year.
Only Australia enforces any meaningful degree of sportsbook regulation. Aussie books stiff no one because they're required to segregate client balances in trust accounts.
If banking secrecy is so great in Panama, and BetPanAm's "head honcho" is a Panamanian native anyway as described by Shrink, thus beyond the reach of U.S. authorities, why doesn't he escrow the customer funds of his new book or secure them in a verifiable trust?
Proponents of BetPanAm behave as if caught in a time warp in which the catastrophic sportsbook failures of early 2002 never happened. They count on glowing testimonials emanating from the usual suspects to again suffice in place of a track record.
If you take the bait, you'll only encourage them.
Parlaythis123@hotmail.com
Is BetPanAm Safe?
By Parlaythis
September 17th, 2003
How sharp was Monty?
So sharp that when he opened his new sportsbook and started taking baseball wagers, Pinnacle - the graveyard where losing sides of scalps go to die - shamelessly cloned his overnight lines to the penny.
In the 1990's, when he ran the book now known as CRIS, Monty never backed away from any player. Whenever a customer laid a big bet, Monty knew the reason. He knew the middlers and scalpers. A select group of syndicates and originators, like Billy Walters and Billy Baxter, were known as "snappers," because when they called, clerks were required to raise their hands above their heads and snap their fingers. This alerted other bet-takers to momentarily stop giving out lines, protecting CRIS from getting double popped at the same price by additional beards or followers before Monty could adjust his odds. By contrast, certain squares and whales inhabited a kind of pay-no-mind list; with clerks specifically instructed not to call out their action no matter how large. Make a mistake that allowed a wiseguy to get so much as an extra half-point, and Monty, described by one clerk as "a big scary guy," would jump in your face, veins bulging out of his thick bull neck. "That's twenty thousand dollars you just f'n cost me," he'd scream.
Monty's own book, Caribi, debuted on the Don Best service on January 23, 2000. Under Monty, CRIS' line had appeared on the screen as "Caribi" because it was considered the Caribbean line; the one everybody followed. Taking the name with him for his new venture ensured that all would know that the numbers listed under "Caribi" were Monty's numbers.
Its exclusive agreement to carry CRIS' lines made Don Best. The company was so grateful to Monty that it kept Caribi on its Premium Service even as the book ran into trouble early in football season, all the way up to the time Caribi pulled the plug for good on June 2, 2001.
Caribi hit an iceberg while booking over its head during what's supposed to be the most lucrative part of the year. It started slow paying big credit customers in September. In December, it announced a "complete restructuring," by then buried in debt on transfers to other books, and behind in its payments to post-up players as well.
Monty was one of the most respected figures in the industry when he started Caribi - a far cry from the image with which he emerged of a discredited cokehead-pervert who lusted after teen-age transvestite hookers.
Some critics were quick to blame his personal vices for Caribi's demise. Imagine that, a Costa Rican bookie heavily into drugs and whores - I'm shocked. But it's clear that the reputation of offshore bookmaking as a difficult business for a new book to break into remained intact, although Monty's reputation didn't.
The Dunes was another heavily hyped newcomer at the beginning of the 2000 baseball season. Like BetPanAm, this summer's celebrated new arrival, Dunes opened for telephone wagers before its website was ready to accept Internet bets.
Dunes offered in-progress betting and 25% sign-up bonuses and quickly gained a place on Bettorsworld, then the web's premier sports betting forum. Bettorsworld co-owner Jeff put the book on his once prestigious "list" of recommended sportsbooks. On April 6, 2000, he gushed, "I can tell you that the people doing the bookmaking have been in the bookmaking biz for many years and are as sharp as they come."
Sound familiar?
Dunes maintained a strong forum presence with the help of its spokesperson, the ubiquitous Samantha. She flirted with customers, answered their questions, wrote articles, and did everything but lick her own nipples and claim to look like Halle Berry.
As soon as the New Year rolled around, Samantha announced "a complete reorganization" for the Dunes. In a bizarre, rambling statement, she denied financial problems and instead blamed the book's rash of slow pays on mysterious Russian hackers. In reality, Dunes' woes probably had more to do with its owners' gambling habits and questionable integrity.
Shortly thereafter, with the original owners supposedly gone, but Samantha staying put, Dunes tried to rebound. It managed to pay out sporadically, but died a lingering death, succumbing by January 2002.
But the book that most resembled PanAm was the original Direcbet.
With a management team comprised of Pinnacle expatriates, most of who teamed earlier as executives of Darwin-based DAS (now BetAustralia), Direcbet copied Pinnacle's low-juice model from the outset. Like its giant Curacao neighbor, Direcbet actively discouraged phone wagers to cut costs. Initially, the book imposed a $2000 minimum on telephone wagers.
They also milked a much-ballyhooed English gaming license for all it was worth. Actually, the license belonged to a Direcbet board member, who maintained it long after selling a small 8-shop chain of British brick-and-mortar sportsbooks.
Naturally, sports betting "watchdog" sites couldn't get enough.
Neither could their posters. Testimonials poured forth in a torrent.
One friend of the book's top brass exulted, "You won't go wrong there, they have got some serious money behind them, plus they know the pitfalls of the game and what they'd do better than their previous employers."
And how about this gem from web-tout "Betting Prophets," posted on March 25, 2001, just weeks after Direcbet's launch: "if AJ (Thompson, IT director) or Matt (Keats, marketing director) tells who is THE MONEY behind Direcbet you would NEVER worry about them being in ANY financial difficulty."
As the 2001 baseball season wore on, Direcbet progressively ratcheted its reduced juice upward and lowered the breakpoint for departure from its minimum 8-cent straddles. Bloodied by wiseguys, the book dramatically slashed limits before suddenly reneging on its heavily promoted -105 offer on NFL sides. Instead, on September 5, Direcbet introduced a "triple touchdown (21%) bonus," which also included a promised rebate on wager amounts.
By now, the book was in serious trouble. Already a slow pay, though not widely known as such, reports began to surface of Direcbet demanding matching deposits on the proceeds from promotional "free accounts" and denying withdrawals under various pretexts. The book took to hiding in plain sight, as it stopped answering e-mails or responding to "live help," and slinked away from the forums. On September 26, AJ Thompson was forced to acknowledge the slow pay situation in an official statement.
On September 29, Bettorsworld's Jeff tried to sound optimistic about the new book he welcomed as an advertiser almost 7 months earlier: "I believe the players at direcbet will be ok. If they can't pay, someone in Curacao is likely to step in and help. They have a reputation (curacao) to uphold. They don't want deadbeats over there."
But, as the Curacao books sat on their hands, it was Costa Rica-based Pariaction that actually saved the day, announcing a tentative agreement to acquire the floundering Direcbet on October 23, 2001.
Now, almost 2 years later, BetPanAm attempts to accomplish what the original Direcbet couldn't - survive as a rookie sportsbook in a now much more crowded reduced-juice niche.
In a carefully orchestrated marketing campaign beginning well before its inception, BetPanAm has been the subject of numerous laudatory articles and press releases. One story even made the ludicrous assertion that Panama, where BetPanAm claims to be the first officially licensed sportsbook, is a G7 nation.
At his "Prescription" website, where PanAm is an advertiser, and where paid moderators and shills sit at rapt attention like an infomercial audience ready to applaud on cue, "The Shrink" penned a puff piece entitled, "Here Comes Panama." On BetPanAm's home page, a blurb above a link to Shrink's article declares, "The therx.com recently visited us to check out our establishment and fact-dig."
That's funny, because I've never heard Anna Nicole Smith referred to as a "fact-digger."
I decided to find out if BetPanAm would submit its operation and business strategy to genuine critical scrutiny. On August 25, at his request, I e-mailed the following list of proposed interview questions to PanAm's Marty Monroe:
1) How will BetPanAm differ from from previous much-hyped start-ups like Caribi, Dunes or Direcbet -- the latter of which also embraced the low-juice model and fielded a management team drawn from respected books, including Pinnacle?
2) How do you expect to compete with entrenched rivals without giving away the store in bonuses or line value?
3) How do you expect to cope initially with a disproportionate share of wiseguys and sharp players -- can you, and, as a new book, won't you have to?
4) When do you expect to become profitable, and how long are you prepared to operate without a profit?
5) Do the terms of your license not allow you to have credit customers?
a) Does a book new to post-up need a preexisting credit base to survive while attempting to gain a foothold in a saturated market?
6) Will your owners function as "backers," sending funds as needed, or do you have all the cash up front required to operate and pay winners for the foreseeable future?
a) If you're adequately funded, why not escrow client balances or place them in a verified trust account like All World?
7) Can you please explain the licensing system in Panama, and do you hold a "master license"?
8) Why should the "master license" concept work better in Panama than it has in Curacao?
9) Didn't you have to post a $500,000 bond as a condition of licensing, and how much of that $500k did BetPanAm put up in actual cash?
10) Is the $500k strictly in case of a dispute upheld in a customer's favor?
a) What kinds of disputes and what's the protocol for resolution?
b) How long is it expected to take to formally resolve a dispute?
11) Why won't the Panamanian government give up bookies and customer and banking records to the U.S.?
12) Didn't a couple of books open in Panama as early as the mid-90's, only to eventually have the army barge in and demand protection money and seize cash?
a) Why won't you need to worry about such a scenario?
13) Will Panamanian banks have to risk their correspondent relationships with U.S. banks to continue doing business with you, and would they be willing to do so?
14) Can you please confirm the background information made public regarding your managers? As I understand, it's Richard Long, managing director, formerly with Betmaker and Sportingbet; Scotty King, player development, formerly with Pinnacle; and you, Marty Monroe, marketing director, formerly of Galaxy and Royal.
15-16) Author's note: Questions 15 & 16 inquired about some specific sports offerings and their odds.
17) Do you provide one free monthly withdrawal, and is that per calendar month, like Pinnacle?
a) Does that include Western Union?
b) If so, won't that get expensive?
After forwarding the above queries, I had no further contact with Marty.
Of course, it doesn't matter whether BetPanAm chooses to respond to the inquiries of a lone Internet columnist, but the book has continuously declined to address any substantive issues relating to its viability or the safety of player funds.
Instead, we get only hollow assurances from the usual cast of paid promoters and unrepentant shills, blithely oblivious to their dismal record of leading the lambs to slaughter.
Last year was not particularly kind to "The Shrink" in his role of self-appointed "watchdog," with Prescription-endorsed bookmakers like BetMega stiffing gamblers and vanishing faster than threads that prove too embarrassing to the Rx or its advertisers.
On September 19, 2001, Shrink rolled out the welcome mat for GrandMaster Sports: "They are clearly one top notch sports book that we highly endorse."
On July 2, 2002, a headline in the Rx Offshore forum read, "Grandmaster Sports Has Disappeared."
After warning bettors away from NAB on February 7, 2002 because its principals allegedly cheated Rio in the Skybook sale, Shrink took aboard NAB's newly spun off post-up division, New Age Bets, on August 30. By October, they were roadkill.
WagersParadise, the upstart apparently run out of a back room at Buckeye Sports by one guy, joined the Rx on November 11 and promptly assumed sponsorship - for participants willing to send a deposit, naturally - of a football contest previously bankrolled by NAB. You can guess what happened next.
"Krackman," like his friend Shrink, emerged from the NAB debacle with a tarnished image. On October 9, he praised the book on 2 different forums with the identical statement, "Just want to let you guys know I have cracked this place as of late and have received every payout with ease and zero problems. Good book with some good incentives."
When NAB was exposed as broke less than a week later, Krackman, known as a well-connected, large bettor, quickly fell under suspicion. Though the $40,000 or more he claims to have lost could be construed as providing ample motive, no one has divulged any tangible proof that Krackman acted to lure the unsuspecting into bailing him out, an allegation he vehemently denies. If not, his untimely twin posts combined with the monetary loss to make him an undeserving double loser.
Undaunted by his similar lack of prescience regarding Direcbet, Betting Prophets, on February 25, 2002, famously remarked, "YOU'RE MONEY IS SAFE at Camelot and I would wager my kids on that pal."
Less than 2 weeks later, the troubled sportsbook turned out the lights. Krackman, who subsequently disclosed that Markdel, who ran Camelot, advised him to grab $1500 from the book's Neteller account before it was too late, and BP both supported Markdel to the end and beyond.
Nobody knows if BetPanAm will meet the same fate, but although people always believe they'll get out in time, rest assured that the insiders have better information than you, and will head straight to the front of the queue if the ship starts sinking.
No evidence exists that the trio of Krackman, Shrink and Betting Prophets can predict which new books will survive. Because they all own websites on which PanAm pays to advertise, they have little incentive to even try.
Still, I would have recommended that anyone contemplating signing up with PanAm do so through Krackman's Bettors Pub site because he briefly promised to guarantee post-up funds to a maximum of $1000 per player, an acknowledgement of the perceived risk associated with a new book. However, he informed me that he abandoned the plan because of legal concerns, so that possible extra layer of protection is gone.
The case for BetPanAm rests on reduced juice, experienced management, fast payouts, and licensure and regulation by a hopefully hospitable Panamanian government.
We already have other regulated or well-established books charging vig comparable to, or even lower than PanAm, including Canbet, Betworks, BetAustralia, Hollywood, IIS and Pinnacle.
We've seen that management's experience and background take a back seat when it comes to new sportsbooks.
BetPanAm was touted as having the fastest payouts in the industry a month before its August 15 opening. Its exclusive "FlexCard" supposedly makes this possible. But Neteller and PrePaidATM both offer debit cards. Aces Gold, Camelot and NAB all paid fast too before they ran out of money.
Panama is a nice place if you're a mosquito. But it remains unproven as a sportsbook jurisdiction.
Antigua was supposed to regulate the books. But its Directorate of Offshore Gaming didn't lift a finger to help players stiffed by Eddie Hadeed when it closed his new book, Alladin's Gold, in March of last year.
Only Australia enforces any meaningful degree of sportsbook regulation. Aussie books stiff no one because they're required to segregate client balances in trust accounts.
If banking secrecy is so great in Panama, and BetPanAm's "head honcho" is a Panamanian native anyway as described by Shrink, thus beyond the reach of U.S. authorities, why doesn't he escrow the customer funds of his new book or secure them in a verifiable trust?
Proponents of BetPanAm behave as if caught in a time warp in which the catastrophic sportsbook failures of early 2002 never happened. They count on glowing testimonials emanating from the usual suspects to again suffice in place of a track record.
If you take the bait, you'll only encourage them.
Parlaythis123@hotmail.com
