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Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

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Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#71

Post by TheGrumpyBrit »

alasdair_ wrote: post #6

"Ivey and Sun adjusted the odds of Baccarat in their favor. This is in complete contravention of the fundamental purpose of legalized gambling" Note that, according to the judge, the "fundamental purpose of legalized gambling" is for the house to always win.

The actual quote from the judgment is "allowing a player to unilaterally adjust the odds of a casino game in his favor – to any degree - would violate the essential purpose of legalized gambling." - which presumably refers to N.J.S.A 5:12-1(4) [1], which says that legalized gambling is a "tool of urban redevelopment" to "facilitate the redevelopment of existing blighted areas and the refurbishing and expansion of existing hotel, convention, tourist, and entertainment facilities." - In other words, "legalized gambling is supposed to bring money in, not let it out."

[1] http://www.nj.gov/casinos/actreg/act/docs/cca-article01.pdf

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#72

Post by imagist »

failrate wrote: post #11

As a game designer, I find casino "games" frustrating, because they are designed to not only mitigate skill, but also luck, in favor of the house. The fact that the casinos have roped in John Law to steal back their winnings after they were taken fair and square is especially galling. If they were grown-ups, they would take their beating, ban Ivey and Sun for life, and change their processes to avoid being beaten aga…

Corporations are by nature amoral, only caring about money.

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#73

Post by ceejay »

It's beyond belief that people spend money to gamble at casinos. It's one thing to know with 100% certainty that the house has the odds in their favor. But an entirely different beast to know that AND know that if you do find ways to win the casinos will still do everything in their power to prevent you from taking home the winnings.

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#74

Post by brownbat »

All those preconditions reminded me that,

"One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand-new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you're going to wind up with an ear full of cider."

It also reminded me of Don Johnson, who saw casinos desperate for high rollers and set up a few conditions on a private Blackjack game that actually shifted the odds ever so slightly. Won $15 Million from Atlantic City's desperation or stupidity, then got to keep the money.[0]

If Ivey had chosen a game with just a little skill, he might have been able to cool the mark with some cover story about a new statistical technique and get away with it.

[0] http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:PVyNBmJ...

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#76

Post by pavel_lishin »

croon wrote: post #51
bluesign wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you can prove, casino knows[1] that the cards are not symmetrical, yes. "knowingly to use or possess any marked cards"

Isn't the ruling above saying just that? Otherwise they're having their cake and eating it too. So which is it?

They know it now; they did not know it previously.

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#77

Post by RHSeeger »

ceejay wrote: post #73

It's beyond belief that people spend money to gamble at casinos. It's one thing to know with 100% certainty that the house has the odds in their favor. But an entirely different beast to know that AND know that if you do find ways to win the casinos will still do everything in their power to prevent you from taking home the winnings.

I'll occasionally go to the casino with my wife, and put aside a couple hundred dollars for the night. I play at the low end blackjack tables and she generally enjoys slots. For a couple hundred dollars, we both get an entire night's worth of entertainment (we both enjoy the playing, we don't expect to win). Sometimes, we even win some (little) money, which adds to the fun.

At the end of the day, it works out to spending money for entertainment, the same as any other night out.

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#78

Post by sleepychu »

gtlondon wrote: post #62

Interesting case. The real question for me is: Why does a Casino use card patterns that are not symmetrical? Considering how much resource is invested to make sure everything else is as precise as possible, this seems suspicious / unusual.

They're supposed to be symmetrical, but I guess some part of the printing process/card design/some odd combination of the two made them almost imperceptibly asymmetric.

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#79

Post by jmkni »

brownbat wrote: post #74

All those preconditions reminded me that, "One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand-new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand-new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you're going to wind up with an…

It seems that Phil Ivey and Don Johnson are friends

Relevant comment from up the thread - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13227643

Re: Famed poker pro with ‘remarkable’ $9.6M scheme has to pay it back

#80

Post by lordnacho »

The casino operators need to think about the law of large numbers.

If you have an edge, what you want is for a bunch of little guys to bet against you. Your certainty of winning against a million little bets is enormous, if you have an edge. And you do, because those games are made that way.

What you don't want to do is bet a few big bets. You might be smarter than me at guessing the outcome of an election, or a coin toss, or any other event, but if there's only one, you may very well still lose.

If you have a few huge fish, there's almost no point in having the little ones. Your outcome depends on the huge bets.

It's not just casinos who don't know this. I had a friend at a hedge fund complaining to me that he was allowed to risk ~1MM USD/bp on interest rates, but he sat next to a guy who was allowed ~50MM USD/bp. So everyone's bonus depended on the big guy, and everyone else might as well just not be there.

It's possible the casino simply considers the gambler's risk-of-ruin stop to be sufficiently close that they'll mostly hit that stop.

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