Now Blanca Gaming, which owns the Cereus Poker Network of Absolute Poker and UB Poker, has issued their own statement just hours after the story broke –where they have been completely unreachable before this point. Here is the statement issued by Blanca Gaming:

“As previously stated, Absolute Poker and UB ceased their U.S.-facing operations due to recent legal developments in the United States. The company is currently restructuring and is focusing its resources on consolidating its non-U.S., rest-of-the-world operation and software business. In order to have a more efficient and successful future business, an immediate need to downsize and streamline operations significantly at both online poker rooms has been required.  Absolute Poker and UB continue to operate their non-U.S.-facing business.

This decision comes after considerable review and analysis of the impact that ‘Black Friday’ has had on the business as a whole. The workforce has been liquidated, and the process of rehiring approximately 20% of staff in key positions has commenced. All affected employees have been informed of this necessary restructure.

A company spokesperson said: “We regret that we have been compelled to take these actions.  We have worked tirelessly to create a truly amazing company that is filled with extraordinary people. We have always been and still remain fully committed to our employees and players. At the same time, we are confident that this restructuring will strengthen the company and its future.”

The Company spokesperson also addressed erroneous reports that Blanca has filed for bankruptcy. The apparent confusion over this issue stems from the fact that Blanca recently informed a debt holder, Madeira Fjord, that it was terminating debt payments to, and its relationship with them.  As a result, Madeira Fjord apparently filed a notice of bankruptcy in Norway. This notice has no negative impact upon Blanca, the operating company, or its brands.  As stated previously, Absolute Poker and UB continue to operate their non-U.S. facing business around the world.

For non-U.S. players, Absolute Poker and UB have increased their maximum withdrawal limits to $1000 for Visa withdrawals and $500 for all other methods.  The number of transactions being processed per day has been significantly increased as well.  Players are still restricted to one transaction per week, but we are working to return non-U.S. withdrawals to normal service levels as quickly as possible.

As confirmed earlier this week, the company’s legal counsel is in continuing discussions this week with the U.S. Attorney’s office to formalize an agreement that would facilitate the return of funds to U.S. players”

So, despite the writing on the wall it appears that the Blanca Gaming is not going to “go down with the ship”.

Apparently the parent company of the sites is known as Madeira Fjord (located in Norway), which represents the shareholders of Absolute Poker’s parent company Blanca Gaming, and in an alleged E-Mail posted at Holdem Poker Chat the following was sent to shareholders:

Dear Madeira Fjord, AS Shareholder,

Since the last meeting of shareholders, there have been a number of developments that affect our Company.

Most importantly, Blanca Gaming has provided notice to our subsidiary Avoine that it is currently unable to make any payments toward its debt obligations. Additionally, Blanca has further advised that there will be no future payments.

Over the past 60 days, the Company has accumulated current debts in excess of $250,000 which are increasing at $100,000+ per month. These obligations are primarily legal and professional fees in Norway.

With no cash on hand and no prospects for any cash flow for the foreseeable future, the Board of Directors is required by Norwegian law to enter the bankruptcy process. The Oslo court will appoint a Receiver who will review the affairs of the Company including the assets, liabilities, and its recent transactions. After a full assessment, the Receiver will make a determination how to enforce any applicable rights, obligations, and obtain the maximum value for its assets in the best interest of the Company.

As the Receiver is a court appointed 3rd party, we can be assured that the Receiver will evaluate all relevant options including any applicable soliciting proposals from interested parties related to the assets of the Company. Funds accumulated through the Receivers’ efforts will be disbursed according to Norwegian law.

As of the date of the filing, the Board of Directors is relieved of duty, and all future matters are in the sole control of the Receiver.

Sincerely,
Madeira Fjord, AS Board of Directors

While this is still unconfirmed, MSNBC was able to confirm through a source in Costa Rica –where the Cereus Poker Network is located—that approximately 95% of the 300 employees in customer support and marketing have been let go by the company.

The article also states that players, even outside of the US, have been unable to withdraw from Absolute Poker or UB Poker since Black Friday. Based on the evidence at hand –plus the 76% drop in traffic the network has experienced since Black Friday according to www.pokerscout.com – it would seem that players are unlikely to recover their money from either Absolute Poker or UB Poker.

Today the league –which is still unnamed, and still without a TV deal—announced both the 218 players that made the cut, as well as the criteria they used in determining the players who would be eligible.

Overall, there were very few “snubs” with most pointing to Phil Laak, Liv Boeree, and former WSOP Champs like Jonathan Duhamel, Joe Cada, and Chris Moneymaker as the most notable players who missed the cut –Laak just barely misses qualifying based on the 2-Year (B) criteria detailed below, but he still has until August to qualify.

Here is a look at the criteria used:

5-Year Card

• At least $4.0 million in adjusted lifetime earnings, with the single largest win capped at $2.0 million
• At least 3 major lifetime titles
• At least 9 cashes since January 1, 2008, for a total of at least $600,000 won

3-Year Card

• At least $2.5 million in adjusted lifetime earnings, with the single largest win capped at $1.5 million
• At least 1 major lifetime title
• At least 9 cashes since January 1, 2008, for a total of at least $500,000 won

2-Year Card Category A

• At least $2 million in adjusted lifetime earnings, with the single largest win capped at $1 million
• At least 1 major lifetime title
• At least 6 cashes since January 1, 2008, for a total of at least $300,000 won

2-Year Card Category B

• At least $1.25 million in adjusted lifetime earnings, with the single largest win capped at $750,000
• At least 9 cashes since January 1, 2008, for a total of $600,000 won

There are a number of stipulations involved with the process including what tournaments are considered “majors”, as well as the minimum buy-in and number of entrants a tournament must have to even be considered, all of which can be found at the Federated Sports and Gaming website.

Overall, the FS+G Poker League doled out the following “Tour Cards”:

• 27 Five-Year Tour Cards
• 55 Three-Year Tour Cards
• 36 Two-Year (A) Tour Cards
• 100 Two-Year (B) Tour Cards

You can find the complete list of eligible players at the FS+G website as well.

Gus Hansen, despite a losing streak that has seen him drop nearly $1.5 million, Hansen is still in the top spot on the winners list, and still over $1 million ahead of his nearest competitor. On the flip side, Tom “durrrr” Dwan is still the biggest loser for the year with nearly $2.5 million in losses through the first four months of 2011 –Dwan may be one of the US players who moves abroad to continue to ply his trade at the online poker tables.

Here is a look at the Top 10 money winners through April 2011 according to www.highstakesdb.com:

1. Gus Hansen – Full Tilt Poker — $3.133.058
2. jungleman12 – Full Tilt Poker — $1.952.994
3. gavz101 – PokerStars — $1.875.438
4. Patrik Antonius – Full Tilt Poker — $1.775.709
5. Matt Hawrilenko – Full Tilt Poker — $1.440.090
6. Bixiu – Full Tilt Poker — $1.406.194
7. Phil Ivey – Full Tilt Poker — $1.336.313
8. NoPasaran – Full Tilt Poker — $1.185.294
9. Ingenious89 – Full Tilt Poker — $1.079.552
10. EazyPeazy – Full Tilt Poker — $998.625

And of course, here is a look at the top losing players according to www.highstakesdb.com:

1. Durrrr – Full Tilt Poker — $-2.474.309
2. kagome kagome – Full Tilt Poker — $-1.922.748
3. fishosaurusREX – Full Tilt Poker — $-1.399.950
4. cadillac1944 – Full Tilt Poker — $-1.336.308
5. UarePileous – Full Tilt Poker — $-940.563
6. DrugsOrMe – Full Tilt Poker — $-830.315
7. David Benefield – Full Tilt Poker — $-742.419
8. Cole South – Full Tilt Poker — $-710.207
9. Ziigmund – Full Tilt Poker — $-704.277
10. Skjervoy – Full Tilt Poker — $-674.277

The player to really watch for the rest of the year will likely be Patrik Antonius, who has been on a $2.3 million heater throughout April, and with some of his stiffest competition now sitting on the sidelines, the man with the self-described “worst game selection in online poker” it could be a record-setting year for one of the best online poker players in the history of the game.

Another player who has been making huge waves since Black Friday is Jens “Ingenious89” Kyllonen, who also plays under the name “jeans89” at PokerStars, and is up about $1.7 million in April alone.

While the above description represents the glamorous side of the game, and there are a few dozen poker players living this lifestyle, the majority of poker “pros” are more in line with the players that appear in Matt Gallagher’s new documentary, Grinders, on the underground poker scene in Toronto.

As Gallagher told the Canadian Press:

“People see that poker is this glamorous event and you see the World Series of Poker on TV and people making millions and they’re travelling the world,” the Windsor, Ont., native said in a recent interview.

“What I wanted to do is I wanted to show these guys who call themselves ‘grinders,’ who sort of grind through their daily existence just trying to make their $200 a day or $500 a day. They treat poker as a 40-hour-a-week job that they go in at 8 o’clock and check out at 3 o’clock or 4 o’clock in the morning.

“Their objective is to get the bills paid and to pay the mortgage and get diapers on the baby and all that other stuff that people in regular jobs do all the time — but these guys happen to do it in illegal poker rooms.”

Not only does Grinders track the lives of a number of small stakes poker pros –the underground poker clubs in Toronto was how Daniel Negreanu began his poker career, and during the movie Gallagher makes the trek to Las Vegas to talk to the poker legend—it also looks into the day-to-day operations of the game at these illegal card clubs and Gallagher’s journey from outsider to part of the underground poker culture.

“When I went to my first game, they actually thought I was a cop and that’s not uncommon, because when you’re new they’re always on the lookout for undercover cops,”

“But I sort of hung around for a long time and then they found out I was a filmmaker, which in some cases is probably actually worse than being a cop, because a lot of these people are happy with the anonymity of that poker scene and they don’t want it talked about.”

From the sounds of the film, this is not your average poker documentary featuring 22 year-old millionaires, and will likely shed some new light on just what it means to be called a professional poker player. The film is currently playing at the Hot Docs Film Festival and will air on TVO this fall.

I have embedded the graphic below so you can check it out or show it to your friends. Thanks to John for letting me share.

Click to View Larger Image.

Schmidt explains how the average player signing up to an online poker site is at a severe disadvantage because the overwhelming majority of these players are not only inferior players to begin with, but are also playing against opponents who are using tools that give them an even further advantage. Schmidt talks about how new players are likely playing without:

“1. Tracking programs that statistically break down hand histories
2. Buddy finding” programs that find and direct the user towards weak opponents at the tables based on their poor performance on the saved-hand histories that sharks have.
3. Memberships to data-pooling websites that track all hands played across the various online poker rooms that tell players about opponents they have never even played with.”

Basically this would be along the lines of an amateur golfer signing up to play Tiger Woods –and in online poker terms this would be done virtually anonymously—with the added handicap of Tiger using cutting edge golf balls and clubs that the amateur player has no idea exist! Sure he could buy the same tools if he knew about them, but if only people “in the know” have this knowledge it seems to me to be an unfair advantage.

While many online poker pros would argue to the contrary –and many do on the 2+2 thread that has come about because of Dusty Schmidt’s blog post—Schmidt’s points are extremely valid in that by trying to beat the “fish” that show up at the tables as quickly as possible they actually cause many of these players to quit online poker, and other possible players to simply avoid the sharks at the online poker tables and all their “cheating” tools and software. As Schmidt puts it:

“But what’s worse is that when someone attempts to come in from the outside and join our community, they quickly surmise that they are in a caste system with insiders and disadvantaged outsiders (or high school run amok). Between our insider knowledge and vicious comments at the tables, we may be the only industry that actively discourages new customers.”

You can read Leatherass’ entire blog post (it’s an excellent read) at the following link: It’s Time To Clean Up Poker (Part 1)

Part of the problem likely stems from many poker players still waiting to receive their funds from Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars –the latter of which just commenced withdrawals to US players on Tuesday—which means that many players are minus sizable portions of their bankrolls.

Of the 438 players that did turn-out for Day 1a of the San Remo tournament, a number of big names in the poker world were able to move on to Day 2 of the tournament on Friday, I’m sure with a nice relaxing day in San Remo on Thursday’s agenda. In all 211 of the 438 entrants survived Day 1a, with Russian Leonid Bilokur out in front of the field with 187,900 chips.

Here is a look at the chip-leaders at the end of Day 1a according to PoekrNews.com:

1. Leonid Bilokur — 187,000
2. Marco Adams — 160,000
3. Andrew Teng — 110,000
4. Ramzi Jelassi — 100,000
5. Mayu Roca — 100,000
6. Max Heinzelmann — 95,000
7. Kimmo Kurko — 90,000
8. Simeon Naydenov — 89,000
9. Sergio Castelluccio — 88,000
10. Martins Adeniya — 82,000

Here are some of the notable names that will also be back in action on Day 2 of the San Remo Main Event: Kevin Vanersmissen, Fabrice Soulier, Fernando Brito, Martin Hruby, JP Kelly, Nicholas Levi, David “DocSands” Sands, Pieter de Korver, Russell “rdcrsn” Carson, Ludovic Lacay, Cornel Cimpan, Casey Kastle, Mickey “mement_mori” Petersen, Vitaly Lunkin, Galen Hall, and Antione Saout.

Day 1b will get underway around 1:30PM local time –remember this is San Remo so start times are not as rigid as they might be in say Berlin—with a number of big name pros ready to take to the tables including last year’s champion Team PokerStars Pro Liv Boeree.

In light of recent developments, PokerStars is no longer offering real money play to residents of the United States of America and its territories.

The PokerStars Cashier is now available for you to cash out the funds in your real money account balance. We strongly recommend that you use the bank transfer option; to use it, you will need to have your current banking information at hand.

Please note that due to the expected high volume of cashout requests, we anticipate a delay in processing and delivery of your funds. Rest assured that your funds are safe and we will process your request as soon as possible.

Please contact paymentservices@pokerstars.com if you experience any issues.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

Regards,

PokerStars Support

All-in-all this is excellent news for poker players, and many players are likely celebrating like they won the WSOP Main Event this evening! Of course there is a little bit of fine print involved as well: Players must cash-out their entire bankroll, and have three options to choose from in regards to withdrawing money –basically one for each type of player:

• High-rollers with a minimum of $50,000 on the site –who were sweating big time– can request a Wire Transfer
• Players with $100 or more can request a check from PokerStars
• Micro-Stakes players can request a bank transfer if they have at least $1 in their account

Players with less than $1 in their account are out of luck –seemingly twice over as they are broke in the first place—and will see their account balances forfeited to PokerStars, which the site says is looking into donating this amount to charity.

Another area of interest –especially to those high-roller types—is the decision on Frequent Player Points, and if they will be allowed to use them in the PokerStars Store, if they will be reimbursed some amount for any unused FPP’s, or if a player’s FPP’s will simply be forfeited.

Sportsbook and PlayersOnly were the two most important rooms on the Merge Poker Network, as they provided almost all of the casual players (fish) to the network. Without this influx of casual players, Merge will be comprised mainly of grinders, most of which will eventually decide to stop battling against each other and will quit playing.

It is unclear whether or not current USA players at Sportsbook and PlayersOnly will be able to continue playing – that is something to keep your eyes on over the next few days. It may be worth creating an account at Sportsbook.com before May 1st, as there is some speculation that current USA players will be able to continue playing there, and the move will only affect new signups after May 1st.

The USA poker outlook is pretty bleak right now – the best option remaining for USA players is Bodog.com.