Australasia-facing online poker operator Poker Asia Pacific.com has announced that it is halting real money activity due to political uncertainty and litigation.
Founded in August 2011 as a news site, the enterprise was acquired late 2015 by Plus EV Pty Ltd., a company owned by bookmaker, professional sports trader and poker player, Luke Brabin and began offering real-money poker action.
The operation has become well known in Australasia for its Aussie Millions and other major online poker events satellite support, and recently carried out its own seven-event live poker tour across Australia.
Over the weekend Poker Asia Pacific management announced that it was closing for an indefinite period “….until pending legal action regarding the Interactive Gambling Act is resolved.”
The full announcement reads:
“Unfortunately, Poker Asia Pacific must suspend its services until pending legal action regarding the [Australian] Interactive Gambling Act is resolved.
“During this time, Poker Asia Pacific will be lobbying strongly to exclude online poker from the Interactive Gambling Act and resume its services without any legal implications.
“We are confident of obtaining a positive result given the current landscape of the online poker market and we want all Australian poker players to be able to play online in a clear, regulated and legal environment as part of the global player pool… but we are expecting to be off the air for 2-3 months.
“We are not seeking to exclude any parties from offering games to Australian poker players, we believe that through amending existing legislation we can ensure that all online poker operators both domestic and international will be able to offer the best product to Australian players in a regulated market and the Australian government will generate revenue through taxing and licensing the operators.
“Please find our petition for regulating the Australian online Poker industry here: https://www.change.org/p/help-us-regulate-online-poker-in-australia
“We apologise for the inconvenience this downtime will cause our players and you are welcome to withdraw your funds if you wish.
“If you are unable to login to request the withdrawal in 24-48 hours from now then please email info@pokerasiapacific.com with your request to withdraw your funds.”