The #1 online casino company $RSI is primed for autism
Positions: $RSI 30 03/19 30C Proof: https://imgur.com/a/swCCMjz *This post is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as investment, financial, or other advice.* TLDR: Rush Street Interactive ($RSI) is the #1 nationwide online casino company and the #3 or #4 sports book depending on the state. Short selling, unwarranted institutional wariness of share dilution and the general market focus on sports book instead of online casino has left $RSI grossly undervalued. A massive blow out at Q4 earnings will result in analyst upgrades and a rapid repricing by market makers and institutions seeking exposure to the emerging sector. **Overview** "Sports book is really just kind of a warm up in a lot of ways for an online casino where the real money is made" - Niccolo De Masi, CEO dMY technologies Rush Street Interactive ($RSI) operates the BetRivers.com online casino and sports book. They are now fully licensed and operating in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Colorado, Iowa, and Virginia. They own and operate a casino in New York and already have a New York license making them well positioned for liberalization there. They merged with a dMY Technology Group SPAC on Dec. 31st 2020 with 240 million on the balance sheet to spend on growth. The online casino business is fundamentally more profitable than sports betting because the average value of a casino player is estimated at $600 while a sports book player could be as little as $20. Estimates put the online casino market at DOUBLE the size of the online sports book market and the online casino industry is really just getting started as more states liberalize. $RSI is expert at new market entry; they have been first to market in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, and Colorado and even when they aren't first they are capable of capturing market share in competitive markets such as New Jersey. They also have products which women play which accounts for at least half of the market in online casino. The female market is one that the pure sports book plays miss out on. Also for some fucking reason they operate a casino and sports book in Colombia (rushbet.co) and may make large expansions into other parts of south America as legalization continues. This means they have the expertise necessary for global expansion in the future although the states remains their primary focus and growth driver. **The Financials and Strategy** Unlike other companies in the space Rush Street is already profitable in 2020 and has a strong focus on Return On Invested Capital (ROIC). Q3 gross revenue was $71.9 Million. Q4 revenue is going to be a blow out. Combing through state gambling revenue data and breaking that down by market share my estimate is that Q4 revenue could be as high as $120 Million. Paired with this blow out will be a **guidance raise to $500 Million for 2021**, which is 2/3 of DraftKings 2021 guidance of $750M. https://imgur.com/a/xkfcayC What is striking when compared to $DKNG is that their advertising spend was only a quarter of revenue in Q3 while $DKNG spent 155% of their revenue. This will change as they begin to focus on growth, but it shows they are very good at getting return on ad spend. This company should actually be valued close to $DKNG based on growth potential once guidance is raised. https://imgur.com/a/RQQXtGg Their focus on attracting **female gamers** is also important to their long term growth potential. The sports book plays with cross sells to casino such as $DKNG will not be able to grow through the female demographic in the same way. **This cannot be understated** as one of the major strategic advantages of $RSI. https://imgur.com/a/xzJj26n As I said before I expect their trend of rapid growth to continue for Q4 earnings, certainly going to be a blow out based on looking at state gambling revenue numbers. My estimate is that their revenue will be around 110M for Q4. I also expect guidance to be raised to 500M for 2021 due to strong performance in existing markets and the recently opened Michigan market as well as their sports book launch in Virginia. https://imgur.com/a/ckTqHhh **Short sellers have entered the chat** The short interest on $RSI sits at 5.08 M shares as of 01/14/21 representing a 30% increase. Now why would a company already valued at 2.8 Billion and with a comparative valuation of 8-10 Billion compared with $DKNG and $PENN be so heavily shorted at such a low market cap? My conclusion is that an institution with 10s of millions to throw at shorting this stock wants to take advantage of fear of share dilution from warrant calling or to establish a better entry prior to earnings. **Commander in GILF Cathie Wood is Bullish on the sector** On Feb. 2nd ARK disclosed that they had purchased 620,300 shares of $DKNG. This is extremely bullish for the sector. I am highly confident that after Q4 earnings ARK will be purchasing shares in $RSI as well due its strategic advantages relative to $DKNG and exposure to the female demographic. For such a small market cap company this will be a major catalyst. **Institutions are bullish** Fidelity has increased their holdings to 14% as of today: https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001793659/8f10b0d8-a3d2-447c-bc75-87587d0a4670.pdf Alliance Bernstein holds a 6% position reported today: http://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001793659/e883778d-e759-4a85-91c1-3242ed110720.pdf **Final notes** Jerome "The Bus" Bettis, Steelers legend and hall of fame running back, is their brand ambassador... This company knows their target audience and how to appeal to them, likely more 'classic' ambassadors to come to attract even more boomer and Gen X degenerates. Keep in mind these are the gamblers with big money to spend, the average age of an online casino gambler is 42. This stock has been grossly underpriced due to short selling. The terms of the SPAC deal were not unfavorable and all the insiders held their shares through the merger banking on growth in the market - **management owns 77% of the company**. This is a true value play on a well managed company in an emerging industry with a market size in the hundreds of billions. I plan to hold shares long term. I will post a part 2 breaking down their latest S-1 filing and Q4 revenue by state when they release their Q4 earnings date. Do your own research. References: https://www.legalsportsreport.com/sports-betting/revenue/ https://fintel.io/doc/sec-rush-street-interactive-inc-ex991-2021-january-05-18632-947 https://s26.q4cdn.com/794539746/files/doc_presentations/2020/RSI-Investor-Presentation-15-Oct-2020.pdf https://ir.rushstreetinteractive.com/news/news-details/2020/RUSH-STREET-INTERACTIVE-ANNOUNCES-THIRD-QUARTER-2020-RESULTS-AND-RAISES-FULL-YEAR-GUIDANCE/default.aspx https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQWEhWuPmzU https://www.thestreet.com/investing/draftkings-surges-as-stake-bought-by-ark-next-generation Positions: $RSI 30 03/19 30C I will be adding 04/16 25cs each week until earnings. Exit strategy: "What's an exit strategy?" - u/deepfuckingvalue Update 021321: IMPORTANT after a commenter pointed out that technically they could report as late as April 2nd I AM RECOMMENDING THAT EVERYONE ROLL OUT TO APRIL 16TH 35Cs
The #1 online casino company $RSI is primed for ingress.
Positions: $RSI 03/19 30C Proof: https://imgur.com/a/swCCMjz This post is for informational purposes only, you should not construe any such information or other material as investment, financial, or other advice. TLDR: Rush Street Interactive ($RSI) is the #1 nationwide online casino company and the #3 or #4 sports book depending on the state. Short selling, unwarranted institutional wariness of share dilution and the general market focus on sports book instead of online casino has left $RSI grossly undervalued. A massive blow out at Q4 earnings will result in analyst upgrades and a rapid repricing by market makers and institutions seeking exposure to the emerging sector. Overview "Sports book is really just kind of a warm up in a lot of ways for an online casino where the real money is made" - Niccolo De Masi, CEO dMY technologies Rush Street Interactive ($RSI) operates the BetRivers.com online casino and sports book. They are now fully licensed and operating in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Colorado, Iowa, and Virginia. They own and operate a casino in New York and already have a New York license making them well positioned for liberalization there. They merged with a dMY Technology Group SPAC on Dec. 31st 2020 with 240 million on the balance sheet to spend on growth. The online casino business is fundamentally more profitable than sports betting because the average value of a casino player is estimated at $600 while a sports book player could be as little as $20. Estimates put the online casino market at DOUBLE the size of the online sports book market and the online casino industry is really just getting started as more states liberalize. $RSI is expert at new market entry; they have been first to market in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, and Colorado and even when they aren't first they are capable of capturing market share in competitive markets such as New Jersey. They also have products which women play which accounts for at least half of the market in online casino. The female market is one that the pure sports book plays miss out on. Also for some fucking reason they operate a casino and sports book in Colombia (rushbet.co) and may make large expansions into other parts of south America as legalization continues. This means they have the expertise necessary for global expansion in the future although the states remains their primary focus and growth driver. The Financials and Strategy Unlike other companies in the space Rush Street is already profitable in 2020 and has a strong focus on Return On Invested Capital (ROIC). Q3 gross revenue was $71.9 Million. Q4 revenue is going to be a blow out. Combing through state gambling revenue data and breaking that down by market share my estimate is that Q4 revenue could be as high as $120 Million. Paired with this blow out will be a **guidance raise to $500 Million for 2021**, which is 2/3 of DraftKings 2021 guidance of $750M. https://imgur.com/a/xkfcayC What is striking when compared to $DKNG is that their advertising spend was only a quarter of revenue in Q3 while $DKNG spent 155% of their revenue. This will change as they begin to focus on growth, but it shows they are very good at getting return on ad spend. This company should actually be valued close to $DKNG based on growth potential once guidance is raised. https://imgur.com/a/RQQXtGg Their focus on attracting **female gamers** is also important to their long term growth potential. The sports book plays with cross sells to casino such as $DKNG will not be able to grow through the female demographic in the same way. **This cannot be understated** as one of the major strategic advantages of $RSI. https://imgur.com/a/xzJj26n As I said before I expect their trend of rapid growth to continue for Q4 earnings, certainly going to be a blow out based on looking at state gambling revenue numbers. My estimate is that their revenue will be around 110M for Q4. I also expect guidance to be raised to 500M for 2021 due to strong performance in existing markets and the recently opened Michigan market as well as their sports book launch in Virginia. https://imgur.com/a/ckTqHhh Short sellers have entered the chat The short interest on $RSI sits at 5.08 M shares as of 01/14/21 representing a 30% increase. Now why would a company already valued at 2.8 Billion and with a comparative valuation of 8-10 Billion compared with $DKNG and $PENN be so heavily shorted at such a low market cap? My conclusion is that an institution with 10s of millions to throw at shorting this stock wants to take advantage of fear of share dilution from warrant calling or to establish a better entry prior to earnings. Cathie Wood is Bullish on the sector On Feb. 2nd ARK disclosed that they had purchased 620,300 shares of $DKNG. This is extremely bullish for the sector. I am highly confident that after Q4 earnings ARK will be purchasing shares in $RSI as well due its strategic advantages relative to $DKNG and exposure to the female demographic. For such a small market cap company this will be a major catalyst. Final notes Jerome "The Bus" Bettis, Steelers legend and hall of fame running back, is their brand ambassador... This company knows their target audience and how to appeal to them, likely more 'classic' ambassadors to come to attract even more boomer and Gen X degenerates. Keep in mind these are the gamblers with big money to spend, the average age of an online casino gambler is 42. This stock has been grossly underpriced due to short selling. The terms of the SPAC deal were not unfavorable and all the insiders held their shares through the merger banking on growth in the market - **management owns 77% of the company**. This is a true value play on a well managed company in an emerging industry with a market size in the hundreds of billions. I plan to hold shares long term. I will post a part 2 breaking down their latest S-1 filing and Q4 revenue by state when they release their Q4 earnings date. Do your own research. References: https://www.legalsportsreport.com/sports-betting/revenue/ https://fintel.io/doc/sec-rush-street-interactive-inc-ex991-2021-january-05-18632-947 https://s26.q4cdn.com/794539746/files/doc_presentations/2020/RSI-Investor-Presentation-15-Oct-2020.pdf https://ir.rushstreetinteractive.com/news/news-details/2020/RUSH-STREET-INTERACTIVE-ANNOUNCES-THIRD-QUARTER-2020-RESULTS-AND-RAISES-FULL-YEAR-GUIDANCE/default.aspx https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQWEhWuPmzU https://www.thestreet.com/investing/draftkings-surges-as-stake-bought-by-ark-next-generation Positions: $RSI 03/19 30C I will be adding 04/16 25Cs each week until earnings Exit strategy: "What's an exit strategy?" - u/deepfuckingvalue Forgot to add: http://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0001793659/8f10b0d8-a3d2-447c-bc75-87587d0a4670.pdf Fidelity just doubled their position to almost 15% Update 021221: Everyone that went in on my initial entry is down 40% right now. As I said I plan to continue to buy 03/19 25Cs each week until earnings. If you’re worried about further losses wait until the day before earnings to load up, you may miss a run up though. Update 021321: IMPORTANT after a commenter pointed out that technically they could report as late as April 2nd I AM RECOMMENDING THAT EVERYONE ROLL OUT TO APRIL 16TH 35Cs
The cannabis market right now is so similar to the start of the green energy market.. its nowhere near done being bullish. Save for some small dips, there will very likely be a huge bullish trend for 2021. EVEN NASDAQ AGREES. I’ve posted my positions a few times, and I’ll continue to do so. But this is my reasoning for investing in cannabis stocks in general for 2021.
I've been a bull on cannabis since the democrats had a strong pro-cannabis platform. But what made me go balls deep into the market was that the UN changed its classification of cannabis. Countries follow the UN closely for guidance on their own classification of controlled substances. Congress has repeatedly cited the UN’s classification as one of the reasons for not changing it. Several countries immediately changed their stance on cannabis in response to this, including Israel, which In November 2020, announced that it was moving forward with a plan to legalize recreational cannabis nationally. “The country is aiming to implement recreational legalization within nine months, and even if there are delays, that means mid-to-late 2021.” (This is my reason for investing in Canadian cannabis companies, because they are already poised to expand internationally since its legal there nationwide)
THE SENATE IS NOW BLUE! The Georgia runoffs were won by Democrats, and they can now swing the vote left with VP Harris. She promised it as part of her platform, so we know it will be prioritized. CHUCK SHUMER SPONSORED THE MORE ACT. HE WILL BE SENATE MAJORITY LEADER. IT WILL 100% BE PRIORITIZED BETWEEN HIM AND VP HARRIS.
EVERYONE predicted beforehand that the republicans would win Georgia... everyone talked down decriminalization passing the house because of they believed it would NEVER pass the republican majority senate. But the left spent more than any senate race in history to encourage voters to go out and vote. Only once the race started did it become clear that the left had a chance. Then some gains from the surprise that they won. However the gains from 1/5 onwards definitely hasn’t been priced in for all the future legislation, because some of it will be completely new legislation that wasn’t possible to consider before without a blue senate. THIS HASN'T BEEN PRICED INTO THE MARKET YET.
The government is broke post-COVID. There is a terrible image of the police. They don’t want to waste more resources on cannabis related crimes that would be fixed under decriminalization. And the tax revenue from decriminalization would be significant. Decriminalization (THE MORE ACT) opens up the borders to interstate-commerce and international import/export. This would all trickle down into Uncle Sam’s empty pockets.
New York Governor Cuomo announced on Jan 6 his plan to legalize marijuana for adult use (right after New Jersey vote, as I anticipated in my last post) as part of his State of the State agenda. The next step is a ripple out on the North East. NY didn’t want to miss out on tax revenue, neither will any of the other states in the northeast within driving distance of NJ and NY. This is Cuomo’s third attempt in three years to legalize adult-use cannabis in the state; last year, Cuomo included a legalization proposal in his state budget, but the plan was ultimately cut in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Other ongoing state legislature:
Rhode Island: Regulators have received 45 applications for six new medical cannabis dispensary licenses in the state. If all applicants meet the requirements for a license, six will randomly be selected in a lottery to operate retail locations in different regions across the state. Read more
Missouri: Rep. Shamed Dogan has filed legislation that would place an adult-use cannabis legalization measure on the state’s 2022 ballot. Meanwhile, Missourians for a New Approach has announced plans for a separate 2022 ballot initiative after an unsuccessful signature campaign to get the issue before voters in 2020. Read more
Alabama: Sen. Tim Melson plans to reintroduce a medical cannabis legalization bill this year. Medical cannabis legislation passed the Alabama Senate during the 2020 session, but failed to clear the House. Read more
Illinois: Illinois lawmakers have proposed the creation of 75 new cannabis retail licenses to give disadvantaged and minority applicants a second chance at licensing following the controversial licensing lottery to issue an initial 75 dispensary licenses. A work group made up of lawmakers and members of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s administration met this week to finalize details of the bill, which will be introduced in a lame-duck session that starts Jan. 8, before new lawmakers are sworn in Jan. 13. Read more
Minnesota: House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler is again renewing his push to legalize adult-use cannabis in the state, announcing plans to reintroduce a legalization bill this year. Winkler told WCCO that he sees “Senate leadership as being the number one obstacle,” but said that if lawmakers agreed to place an adult-use legalization initiative on Minnesota’s 2022 ballot, “it would pass overwhelmingly.” Read more
Virginia: Del. Steve Heretick has reintroduced a bill to legalize adult-use cannabis. Heretick has proposed legislation related to decriminalization and legalization in the past, and this year’s bill would legalize the cultivation, sale and consumption of cannabis in the state. Read more
Connecticut: Gov. Ned Lamont renewed his push for adult-use legalization during his State of the State address Jan. 6, announcing that it is a priority for the new legislative session. Connecticut’s 2021 legislative session opened Jan. 6, and Lamont, a Democrat, kicks off the session with increased majorities in the House and Senate, which could increase his chances of passing an adult-use legalization bill. Read more
Now that you understand why I’m going green, here’s my reasoning for my positions. TLRY (Tilray)
largest cannabis company in the world by revenue post merger. Will run out of Seattle and New York City. New York Legalization on top of senate turning blue is a big catalyst for TLRY.
Merger hasn’t completed yet, and the merger happened before the senate went blue.. that was the gamble APHA was making, and they won. The sky is the limit now. When they merge, they will reduce expenses and be much more likely to post profitable quarters. (This is why mergers have so much hype; the sum is > than their parts because they can reduce operating expenses while maintaining revenue from the two companies)
Tilray CEO Brendan Kennedy: “I think medical cannabis will be legal at the federal level, which means medical cannabis can cross state lines and be imported into the U.S., like we export cannabis from Canada and Portugal to about 15 countries now,” Kennedy said. “Anyone who thinks there’s a state-specific medical market is wrong.” As for the recreational market, Kennedy says the state-specific markets, with interstate trade banned, “are not going to last long.” Kennedy believes that cannabis will be distributed like alcohol and tobacco within two years’ time. That would require significant overhaul of US federal drug laws—and would significantly disrupt all US cannabis companies’ existing business models. Brendan Kennedy, the cannabis billionaire will step down as Tilray's chairman and CEO. Irwin D. Simon, Aphria's current chairman and CEO will take Kennedy's place.
[On December 18, 2020, just three days after the U.S. Senate adopted the Cannabidiol and Marihuana Research Expansion Act (CMREA or the Act) (more on this below), the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA or the Administration) published in the Federal Register a final rule, “Controls To Enhance the Cultivation of Marihuana for Research in the United States” (Rule), which finally paves the way for DEA to issue additional licenses to grow “marihuana” (i.e., cannabis) for research purposes.](https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/on-heels-of-senate-s-adoption-of-36129/)
GNLN (Greenlane Holdings)
One of the largest global sellers of premium cannabis accessories. Pax/JUUL/Volcano products. I’ve had Pax products, and although I prefer Arizer because of the affordability, I can’t deny Pax has quality products and is like the “iPhone” of vaporizers. I like their products, I like their branding. There’s lots of hype and loyalty, especially with their Volcano desktop vaporizer.
Strong US brands.
The main reason they did poorly was bad timing. They IPO’d during the year that JUULs started being banned. They’re actually at all those levels again. Theres a ton of upside potential.
Market cap is ridiculously low for some really renown brands all because of the JUUL flavor pod ban. Everyone knows Pax, Volcano, and JUUL. But no one knows Greenlane because of the bad timing of their IPO and the subsequent JUUL flavor ban. It’s crazy. They’ve already broke all time high for the year. But I’m holding until they break 1B market cap.
Overall i think too many people count it out just because of their IPO and subsequent decline in JUUL sales from the JUUL flavored pods ban. They definitely have the potential because of their strong branding and quality products. I’m betting on them having more high quality products in the future with equally loyal customers.
SNDL (Sundial Growers)
SNDL must close above $1 per share for 10 consecutive sessions by June 26, 2021 or it will bedelisted from NASDAQ. People see this as a fear factor, I see this as “they will do anything necessary to reach $1 for a week so they won’t be delisted”.. IMHO reverse splitter probably isn’t on the table since they could have done that in 2020, but instead applied for a 6 month extension after announcing “alternative strategic investments”. We can already see this by their predatory loan SPAC spinoff.
Rumors of a merger with CGC; SNDL also purchased a SPAC recently and entered an agreement with Zenabis, immediately claiming they defaulted. Turning that SPAC into predatory loan/debt repurchasing company. Imo if they want to complete a merger, it would be easy to sell ownership through that SPAC to the buyer.
THEY RECENTLY WENTDEBT FREE by selling off unprofitable assets in the business. This means we are much more likely to see earnings in future quarters, and they are much more attractive for mergers.
Because they are indoor growers, they are more likely to be bought up by a company in the consolidating Canadian cannabis market than fail all together. The amount of space licensed to grow cannabis in Canada is now heavily skewed toward outdoor cultivation instead of indoor for the first time, according to new data from Health Canada. A growing population of licenses for outdoor growers means that there aren’t as many indoor licenses being given out... If a company ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD wants to quickly expand into indoor growing OR into the west, they would have to purchase an existing company that has the license to quickly do so. This is WAY faster, and a guaranteed way to obtain a license rather than applying for one and waiting x amount of months and be rejected for some requirement that wasn’t met.
From my own experience, outdoor cannabis is subpar quality to indoor grown cannabis. So a growing market for outdoor cannabis doesn’t necessarily mean its better... it is likely just cheaper. I would imagine a high quality “craft cannabis” company would want to purchase SNDL, or an existing outdoor growing company that wants to quickly expand to indoor grown cannabis. With this being a Canadian company, there’s a chance a company in another country like Israel would be interested in purchasing it in the near future.
PLNHF (Planet 13 Holdings)
Biggest tourist trap in Las Vegas if you’re a stoner, casual smoker, or just wanting to try it. From my own experience, I think they will continue to be successful. If I went around the US trying other brands I’d probably be more confident in putting 5-10% of my portfolio into those picks or choosing to not include them lol. Like for example, I used to have Curaleaf. But there's tons of bad feedback on Curaleaf, a friend has tried it said the nug is really subpar quality and if I tried their nug I’d probably confirm that I wouldn’t want to invest in them. With PLNHF, i’ve seen the ambience and tried the product myself. It’s definitely a lot of hype price wise, but still quality. This is my own bias showing, but I still think they’ve got solid fundamentals and excellent location/strong US branding.
I’m well aware of other good stocks like GTBIF, CRLBF, SSPK, TCNNF, GRWG.. but these stocks haven’t been swinging as hard in response to pro-cannabis news. E.g. TLRY, SNDL, GNLN swung more than 20% some days from pro-cannabis news...I will likely reduce my current positions shortly after inauguration, after some news about the timeline for cannabis legislation, and diversify my positions more between these other good picks. 2021 is the year of cannabis boys
This was given an 11 price target (closed over that today) but I think this will be a good long term hold and here is why. The CEO/founder has been involved with online gambling since 1996(!!!). Also, their CIOJohn Brackens was an Activision Blizzard networks manager. They've been in purchase mode recently and bought ggCircuit, a B2B cloud-based management for LAN centers, a tournament platform, and integrated wallet/point-of-sale solutions for enterprise customers. ggCircuit has over 1,000 connected locations and has worked with enterprises such as GameStop, Dell, Best Buy and Lenovo as well as universities such as Ohio State, Syracuse and North Carolina. Their ggLeap product has over 60 million hours of usage by over two million unique gamers on tens of thousands of public gaming screens inside centers worldwide. Also, they bought Helix esports. Helix eSports owns five esports centers, including two of the five largest centers in the US, where they deliver world-class customer service, esports programming and gaming infrastructure. ALSO, they bought Esports Gaming League (EGL). HAS OVER 350K registered gamers. "EGL is a great addition to our growing operations and further strengthens our ability to execute on our three-pillar strategy," commented Grant Johnson, CEO of Esports Entertainment Group. "EGL technology underpins the esports programs for some of the world's best-known sports franchises, including the LA Kings, Philadelphia Eagles, and Arsenal Football Club. We plan to build on this strong foundation moving forward, driving near-term revenue growth and long-term shareholder value improvement." You see the trend, and there is more companies than I listed purchased in the past twelve months. Another thing to consider: -$4.3 Billion in Bets Placed on Super Bowl LV Online bets skyrocketing up by 63% with no signs of slowing -36 million more Americans can now legally bet compared to one year ago, with the addition of Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Montana, Tennessee, Virginia and Washington, DC. How does this translate to this company? People are showing a willingness to bet and it's available to a wider audience than ever before. Here is what I posted before: Business: egaming platform for gambling and tournaments. They also have other gambling functions, I believe egames you can gamble on is something they just bought (lucky dino). They also partnered with the Philadelphia eagles to provide esport tournaments, last month I believe, first partnership with a professional team and an egaming gambling site(this was prior to SKLZ). More partnerships could lead to growth as no other professional franchises have a partnership yet for tournaments. Financials: heavy dilution this past year, just started generating revenue in Q3, negative net income. The company they just bought is internet gambling site they just bought had 21M in revenue last year, est 28M for 2021. Company has very low debt, biggest liability is warrant liability of a few million. 8M of cash on hand, could get through at least 2 quarters without any additional positive cash flow (potentially some more dilution i would imagine). Small institutional ownership (1%) but large insider ownership (35%) Financials drop Feb 20th, so some DD on this let me know what you think. This company is worth around 150M(on 2/8), for comparison draftkings is over 46B and cathie wood also entered this sector buying draftkings so this could be on her list also.
So a couple weeks ago I moved from the great city of Minneapolis to Chicago. Now that the beloved robe-wearing Bomba Squad is considered out of market, I've only watched them a few times when playing the White Sox and Cubs. Meanwhile, the Sox had started looking like a mini Bomba Squad of their own and took over the division lead and I had to listen to that trash all over town. Now, sports gambling being legal is Illinois, I figured I could at least take advantage of this situation and hedge some happiness by making money off the Sox. So I signed up for DraftKings and after proving to them I had recently changed addresses, I got an account last week. Guess how many games I've been on Chicago this year? Four. All four of their losses in the current streak while our boys have taken back the division. I'll keep draining the bank account for that.
The next Detroit: The catastrophic collapse of Atlantic City
With the closure of almost half of Atlantic City's casinos, Newark set to vote on gambling and casinos or racinos in almost every state, it seems as if the reasons for the very existence of Atlantic City are in serious jeopardy. Israel Joffe Atlantic City, once a major vacation spot during the roaring 20s and 1930s, as seen on HBOs Boardwalk Empire, collapsed when cheap air fare became the norm and people had no reason to head to the many beach town resorts on the East Coast. Within a few decades, the city, known for being an ‘oasis of sin’ during the prohibition era, fell into serious decline and dilapidation. New Jersey officials felt the only way to bring Atlantic City back from the brink of disaster would be to legalize gambling. Atlantic City’s first casino, Resorts, first opened its doors in 1978. People stood shoulder to shoulder, packed into the hotel as gambling officially made its way to the East Coast. Folks in the East Coast didn't have to make a special trip all the way to Vegas in order to enjoy some craps, slots, roulette and more. As time wore on, Atlantic City became the premier gambling spots in the country. While detractors felt that the area still remained poor and dilapidated, officials were quick to point out that the casinos didn't bring the mass gentrification to Atlantic City as much as they hoped but the billions of dollars in revenue and thousands of jobs for the surrounding communities was well worth it. Atlantic City developed a reputation as more of a short-stay ‘day-cation’ type of place, yet managed to stand firm against the 'adult playground' and 'entertainment capital of the world' Las Vegas. Through-out the 1980s, Atlantic City would become an integral part of American pop culture as a place for east coast residents to gamble, watch boxing, wrestling, concerts and other sporting events. However in the late 1980s, a landmark ruling considered Native-American reservations to be sovereign entities not bound by state law. It was the first potential threat to the iron grip Atlantic City and Vegas had on the gambling and entertainment industry. Huge 'mega casinos' were built on reservations that rivaled Atlantic City and Vegas. In turn, Vegas built even more impressive casinos. Atlantic City, in an attempt to make the city more appealing to the ‘big whale’ millionaire and billionaire gamblers, and in effort to move away from its ‘seedy’ reputation, built the luxurious Borgata casino in 2003. Harrah’s created a billion dollar extension and other casinos in the area went through serious renovations and re-branded themselves. It seemed as if the bite that the Native American casinos took out of AC and Vegas’ profits was negligible and that the dominance of those two cities in the world of gambling would remain unchallenged. Then Macau, formally a colony of Portugal, was handed back to the Chinese in 1999. The gambling industry there had been operated under a government-issued monopoly license by Stanley Ho's Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau. The monopoly was ended in 2002 and several casino owners from Las Vegas attempted to enter the market. Under the one country, two systems policy, the territory remained virtually unchanged aside from mega casinos popping up everywhere. All the rich ‘whales’ from the far east had no reason anymore to go to the United States to spend their money. Then came the biggest threat. As revenue from dog and horse racing tracks around the United States dried up, government officials needed a way to bring back jobs and revitalize the surrounding communities. Slot machines in race tracks started in Iowa in 1994 but took off in 2004 when Pennsylvania introduced ‘Racinos’ in an effort to reduce property taxes for the state and to help depressed areas bounce back. As of 2013, racinos were legal in ten states: Delaware, Louisiana, Maine, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and West Virginia with more expected in 2015. Tracks like Delaware Park and West Virginia's Mountaineer Park, once considered places where local degenerates bet on broken-down nags in claiming races, are now among the wealthiest tracks around, with the best races. The famous Aqueduct race track in Queens, NY, once facing an uncertain future, now possesses the most profitable casino in the United States. From June 2012 to June 2013, Aqueduct matched a quarter of Atlantic City's total gaming revenue from its dozen casinos: $729.2 million compared with A.C.'s $2.9 billion. It has taken an estimated 15 percent hit on New Jersey casino revenue and climbing. And it isn't just Aqueduct that's taking business away from them. Atlantic City's closest major city, Philadelphia, only 35-40 minutes away, and one of the largest cities in America, now has a casino that has contributed heavily to the decline in gamers visiting the area. New Jersey is the third state in the U.S. to have authorized internet gambling. However, these online casinos are owned and controlled by Atlantic City casinos in an effort to boost profits in the face of fierce competition. California, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Pennsylvania and Texas are hoping to join Delaware, Nevada, New Jersey and the U.S. Virgin Islands in offering online gambling to their residents. With this in mind, it seems the very niche that Atlantic City once offered as a gambling and entertainment hub for east coast residents is heading toward the dustbin of history. Time will tell if this city will end up like Detroit. However, the fact that they are losing their biggest industry to major competition, much like Detroit did, with depressed housing, casinos bankrupting/closing and businesses fleeing , it all makes Atlantic City’s fate seem eerily similar.
Not Financial Advice (NFA) Warning: Wall of Text. If you hate reading just skim through the bolded/italicized Ever since I publicized my findings on DKNG, the stock has underperformed & probably has fucked a lot of people here, especially given the overly bullish stance back in June. Unless you took my advice & got into Puts then, congrats, welcome to tendie town. For the ADHD retards, here’s what the next wall of text is going to summarize: I believe at the current price of ~$30, the stock is oversold. A tech-focused, high-growth Company that has made sports betting easy to understand with an aesthetically pleasing interface similar to how Robinhood has neatly laid out stock market gimmicks so even high-schoolers can make sense of it I believe, is underpriced at these levels. Let’s get into some details as to why the stock has underperformed: First off, the news slate revolving sports with the rumored delay/cancellation of the MLB season & the NFL watching from the sidelines is in my view, just a part of why the stock has underperformed. We’ll revisit this later in this post, but I want to focus on the drivers of the stock’s recent underperformance, & why these factors are now in the rearview mirror. Part I – The Past Has Passed – SPAC-related Equity Dilution History lesson first: DKNG went public via a SPAC merger, which has exploded in popularity recently. Anyone serious about analyzing stocks going forward needs to do their homework on this, Google is your friend. A feature of most SPAC merger to public listings that creates a headwind to near-term share prices are embedded equity dilution events, usually in the form of earn-outs (stock bonuses to execs, the SPAC sponsor) & conversion of Warrants. On 5/24, the earn-outs were triggered, adding 6m shares to the share count. On 6/26, 16.3m warrants converted to DKNG, netting them ~$188m of cash. Stepping back a little, in addition to the above, on 6/18 DKNG launched a follow-on equity offering of 16M shares @ $40/Share [1], receiving $621M in proceeds. The last part is tricky to understand from a dilution perspective. To simplify, historically it’s almost a coin toss whether a Company’s shares outperform on the onset of an equity offering. While issuing shares does dilute the existing shareholder base, it theoretically shouldn’t, if the proceeds from the offering are earmarked for investments/projects that yield outsized returns. This is the reality for the long term, theory for the short-term. For the short-term, the ‘reality’ isn’t that the proceeds will be used for investments/projects that yield outsized returns, it is more about how convincing management is to investors that the investments they intend to pursue with the proceeds will outweigh the dilutive effects of issuing incremental shares. That’s a mouthful, but hopefully you get what I’m trying to convey. All of this stuff put together – the Company has increased its share count by ~39M, but now has a whopping ~$1.4Bn of cash [2]. More on this in the next section. Part II – MLB News Should Not Fucking Matter & DKNG Is Positioned As the Leading Online/Mobile Sports Platform DKNG should not be so tied to MLB news or any of this shit as the ongoing success of the NBA/NHL season + Soccer in Europe has effectively created a blueprint on how to regulate player behavior so that they maintain professionalism amidst the pandemic. I’m going out on a whim here, but I truly think the MLB threatening a cancellation of the season is pure posturing to get these fuckers to behave appropriately. Maybe a ‘bubble’ is what it takes to get these players to focus on their jobs instead of going out & contracting COVID, but I argue that isn’t necessarily required given Soccer in Europe. So there’s already a proven path here without the need for a bubble in Soccer, so MLB/NFL should be fine, and execs need to study how they got it done in Europe. Okay, back to some facts. Anecdotally, I’ve kept in touch with a handful of sports bookies from California to New York & even internationally about what they’re seeing – all of them say that since the NBA season started on 7/30 & since Soccer (especially the Premier League) resumed in June, along with other leagues like La Liga & Serie A, they’ve seen massive increases in betting. These numbers are also showing up in the official data [3]:
Average % increase in sports betting handle from April 2020 to June 2020 (handle is the total $ wagered in sports bets) from the states that reported up to June 2020 (NJ, PA, MS, RI, WV, IA, IN, NH) of +258%!
Note: NV is left out due to the site I sourced showing a weirdly negative number – so I dug into the official filings & show specifically, Sports Mobile betting growth from June since April has growing by at least +73% [4]
REMEMBER: This is for June only! No NBA, No NHL, No MLB, just Soccer, Golf, NASCAR & UFC. The data clearly shows that there was a ton of pent-up sports betting demand, which leads one Wall St. analyst to think that betting on the NBA/NHL could ABSORB the MLB’s sports betting handle (handle = total $ size of sports bet) [5]. Remember, the MLB season is still ongoing, with games being played. The entire focus is on the Miami Marlins & St. Louis Cardinals. Fucking retards. Additionally, I want to remind everyone that DraftKings.com is the #1 Fantasy sports website in the U.S. [6]. Also, since April 2020 site visitations are up +86% [7] & Google Search Trends for “Draft Kings” is up ~3xcompared to PRE-COVID levels [8]. What does this mean? They are piquing more people’s curiosity than prior to COVID/ongoing slate of sports. This is important because remember that ~$1.4Bn chest full of cash I mentioned DKNG had assembled earlier? Well, that money is being put to work & results are already coming in, which is exactly what DKNG intended to do with it. Part III – Legalization of Sports Betting in the U.S. I could write a fucking bible on this topic alone, but for now we’ll stick to some basics. Due to COVID, it’s easy to understand that each State’s financial situation is clearly in shit. Because of this, you better believe that these guys are going to start taking a hard look at how they can extract additional tax revenues, & what’s one of the easiest ways to do this? Legalization & taxation of gambling. The big players: CA, TX, FL & NY. First, CA pushing its legislation out to 2023 was fucked up, but here’s a twist I want to add to this: Anything that has to do with gambling in CA you better believe is lobbied against by not just the Tribal casino owners in CA, but by the deep pockets of Las Vegas money. Similar thing can be said for FL, but let’s take a look at some actions by LV/nationwide gambling companies that are starting to align financial incentives with guys like DKNG.
MGM / GVC Holdings JV in BetMGM - $450m total invested
PENN invests $163m into BS Sports
Caesars has a 20% stake in William Hill plus partnership deals with The Stars Group (TSG) & our winner DKNG for operating its sports books
So it’s safe to say going forward, nationwide legalization of sports betting will reap rewards for everyone involved, & no longer be something LV money is completely focused on safeguarding. Let’s also not forget that DKNG didn’t become the Company they are today because of their fancy app, but because their management team has a HISTORY of navigating the U.S.’s legal framework to get what they want out of it.
The Crown Jewel – The Internet Gambling Prohibition & Enforcement Act: I said it in a previous post, but I want to emphasize that them getting Fantasy Sports to be labeled a ‘game of skill’ by FEDERAL Law as opposed to gambling is just something for the history books. Fucking genius shit. When this happened I bet every casino from LV to every Indian Tribe that has one was against it, yet DKNG & other DFS providers won.
There’s more, but more recently: Getting into IL:
In IL, there’s an 18-month ‘penalty box’ for Companies that offer DFS to offer sports betting. Our guys at DKNG created a workaround to this situation with their partnership with Casino Queen [9]. DKNG being savvy again.
IL, USA - Is it legal for IDHS or any welfare agency to use random number generators to determine placement in job aid programs? Also harassment from survey company.
There's two parts to this, the first part is Illinois Department of Human Services and a job placement program they had started a couple years ago, and the second is some persistent harassment I'm experiencing from Mathematica Policy Research, who are doing "follow up surveys" for people who were interested in that job placement program. The first part, IDHS using random number generators for placement in a job training and placement program. My roommate mentioned to me yesterday when I was telling her about the harassment from MPR that it is illegal for a government agency to make decisions at random or using lottery draw, and all decisions must be made with intent. She's not a lawyer, and I don't seem to be having any luck with my google searching since I just keep getting lottery/gambling related law stuff. I want to know if this is true, and if this has any bearing on my circumstances and if I have the ability to push for legal compensation. The job placement program I can no longer remember the name of was posited like this: Illinois could no longer drag their feet on the work requirements for SNAP, so they decided to offer a "test run" of a new job training program that you could apply for if you were interested, and you would take part in job skills training which would lead to certification and job placement, and that would replace your usual job searching/application requirements to continue receiving SNAP benefits. I was extremely interested in this program, because the kinds of things that were on offer were training in welding, machining, and woodworking, and other trade skills in high demand in the area. I went through the orientation and there were some forms and questions to fill out on a computer that was designed to help you choose what you were going to do for your job skill training course. Afterwards, I was taken to a desk in the same room to talk with a case worker, and she filled out the application form on her computer, and told me my placement was dependent upon a random number generator, supposedly to remove bias. She also said if I did not get in due to the random number generator, that I was prohibited from applying to the program again for a minimum of two years. I did not get into the program. I have no proof that this was truly a random number generator, and I don't even know if I could prove anyone got placement. I have no other information aside from what I was told and what I saw on her screen. I was devastated, but aside from that, had to do the usual "show up every month with 10 'job contacts' to keep getting my benefits, despite working a 20hr a week job, because 20hrs was no longer sufficient to qualify me for not having to seek other employment. They also cut my monthly SNAP from the full $200 to a pittance of $30. I stopped recertifying because there was no point. As part of the application process, you agree to being contacted by Mathematica Policy Research about "voluntary" surveys so they can gauge the effectiveness of the new program compared to the traditional job search requirements. One was 6-12 months from the date of application, the other was 2 years. They offer $40 gift cards in exchange for your participation, so at the time I agreed and did the first survey. It was mostly asking if I was able to get work, if that was related to my SNAP job contacts requirement, and if I was still receiving benefits. Apparently it's come time for round two of the survey, because they contacted at the start of September this year. I agreed to do the survey and then they told me it would take 30 minutes to complete over the phone. After answering some very invasive and personal questions about my employment status and other things, I just decided to hang up and not complete the survey. They called back a few times and I eventually just ignored the calls since the call quality was so bad they couldn't hear me tell them I wasn't interested. My phone also has an issue where often when people call me it goes straight to voicemail even if I have full signal and it's on, etc, and when I finally checked my voicemail a couple weeks later I had eleven missed calls from them asking me to complete the survey. They had also started to send me emails. This feels way too pushy for a survey that is supposedly voluntary, and my repeated ignoring of their calls should have been enough to indicate that I don't want them calling me. I blocked their number and they called from another number. They also sent me physical mail, and at that point I threatened to seek legal action against them for harassment, though I'm not sure it fits the legal definition, I just wanted them to stop contacting me. Then my mom messaged me saying they called her and left her a voicemail, because apparently she was listed as my emergency contact. It seems really creepy that they'd start harassing my family members to get me to complete a survey that is voluntary AFTER I told them to fuck off. I want them to stop, and I want to know if I have the ability to take legal action here. I can't be the only one who's being harassed by these guys, and I can't be the only person who was rejected from this job placement program that could have benefited greatly from it. If I have no legal grounds that kind of sucks but I also would like to know if anyone has advice to get this survey company to get off my back and leave me the hell alone.
“On Tuesday, Tennessee Education Lottery (TEL) CEO Rebecca Hargrove said it is aiming to launch the state’s sports betting market by 1 November at the latest. This means that Tennessee residents will be able to legally bet on sports during the upcoming football season. Sports betting became legal in Tennessee in May 2019 and since then, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Montana and New Hampshire all managed to legalise and launch their sports betting markets. Licensing updates During Tuesday’s Sports Wagering Advisory Council meeting, Hargrove revealed that four operators and approximately 20 vendors and suppliers have applied for licenses. The names of the operators were not disclosed; however, media sources say that BetMGM, DraftKings and FanDuel have applied for a license. The fourth company is Tennessee Action 24/7, a local Tennessee company that offers free-to-play games. On Tennessee Action 24/7’s website, a message says that the TEL is “currently processing our Sports Gaming Operator license application.” In its latest quarterly report, MGM resorts revealed that it currently has market access and plans to launch sports betting operations in Tennessee later this year. Online sports betting only Unlike other states with legal betting, Tennessee’s sports betting laws only permit online and mobile sports betting. Tennessee is the only state to legalise online-only sports wagering, which makes it an outlier in the wider US gambling market.” https://www.compare.bet/news/tennessee-sports-betting-to-go-live-on-1-november
“On Tuesday, Tennessee Education Lottery (TEL) CEO Rebecca Hargrove said it is aiming to launch the state’s sports betting market by 1 November at the latest. This means that Tennessee residents will be able to legally bet on sports during the upcoming football season. Sports betting became legal in Tennessee in May 2019 and since then, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Montana and New Hampshire all managed to legalise and launch their sports betting markets. Licensing updates During Tuesday’s Sports Wagering Advisory Council meeting, Hargrove revealed that four operators and approximately 20 vendors and suppliers have applied for licenses. The names of the operators were not disclosed; however, media sources say that BetMGM, DraftKings and FanDuel have applied for a license. The fourth company is Tennessee Action 24/7, a local Tennessee company that offers free-to-play games. On Tennessee Action 24/7’s website, a message says that the TEL is “currently processing our Sports Gaming Operator license application.” In its latest quarterly report, MGM resorts revealed that it currently has market access and plans to launch sports betting operations in Tennessee later this year. Online sports betting only Unlike other states with legal betting, Tennessee’s sports betting laws only permit online and mobile sports betting. Tennessee is the only state to legalise online-only sports wagering, which makes it an outlier in the wider US gambling market.” https://www.compare.bet/news/tennessee-sports-betting-to-go-live-on-1-november
Meta: Congratulations! You just won millions of dollars in the lottery!
Congratulations! You just won millions of dollars in the lottery! That's great. Now you're fucked. No really. You are. You're fucked. If you just want to skip the biographical tales of woe of some of the math-tax protagonists, skip on down to the next comment. To see what to do in the event you win the lottery. You see, it's something of an open secret that winners of obnoxiously large jackpots tend to end up badly with alarming regularity. Not the $1 million dollar winners. But anyone in the nine-figure range is at high risk. Eight-figures? Pretty likely to be screwed. Seven-figures? Yep. Painful. Perhaps this is a consequence of the sample. The demographics of lottery players might be exactly the wrong people to win large sums of money. Or perhaps money is the root of all evil. Either way, you are going to have to be careful. Don't believe me? Consider this: Large jackpot winners face double digit multiples of probability versus the general population to be the victim of: 1. Homicide (something like 20x more likely) 2. Drug overdose 3. Bankruptcy (how's that for irony?) 4. Kidnapping And triple digit multiples of probability versus the general population rate to be: 1. Convicted of drunk driving 2. The victim of Homicide (at the hands of a family member) 120x more likely in this case, ain't love grand? 3. A defendant in a civil lawsuit 4. A defendant in felony criminal proceedings Believe it or not, your biggest enemy if you suddenly become possessed of large sums of money is... you. At least you will have the consolation of meeting your fate by your own hand. But if you can't manage it on your own, don't worry. There are any number of willing participants ready to help you start your vicious downward spiral for you. Mind you, many of these will be "friends," "friendly neighbors," or "family." Often, they won't even have evil intentions. But, as I'm sure you know, that makes little difference in the end. Most aren't evil. Most aren't malicious. Some are. None are good for you. Jack Whittaker, a Johnny Cash attired, West Virginia native, is the poster boy for the dangers of a lump sum award. In 2002 Mr. Whittaker (55 years old at the time) won what was, also at the time, the largest single award jackpot in U.S. history. $315 million. At the time, he planned to live as if nothing had changed, or so he said. He was remarkably modest and decent before the jackpot, and his ship sure came in, right? Wrong. Mr. Whittaker became the subject of a number of personal challenges, escalating into personal tragedies, complicated by a number of legal troubles. Whittaker wasn't a typical lottery winner either. His net worth at the time of his winnings was in excess of $15 million, owing to his ownership of a successful contracting firm in West Virginia. His claim to want to live "as if nothing had changed" actually seemed plausible. He should have been well equipped for wealth. He was already quite wealthy, after all. By all accounts he was somewhat modest, low profile, generous and good natured. He should have coasted off into the sunset. Yeah. Not exactly. Whittaker took the all-cash option, $170 million, instead of the annuity option, and took possession of $114 million in cash after $56 million in taxes. After that, things went south. Whittaker quickly became the subject of a number of financial stalkers, who would lurk at his regular breakfast hideout and accost him with suggestions for how to spend his money. They were unemployed. No, an interview tomorrow morning wasn't good enough. They needed cash NOW. Perhaps they had a sure-fire business plan. Their daughter had cancer. A niece needed dialysis. Needless to say, Whittaker stopped going to his breakfast haunt. Eventually, they began ringing his doorbell. Sometimes in the early morning. Before long he was paying off-duty deputies to protect his family. He was accused of being heartless. Cold. Stingy. Letters poured in. Children with cancer. Diabetes. MS. You name it. He hired three people to sort the mail. A detective to filter out the false claims and the con men (and women) was retained. Brenda, the clerk who had sold Whittaker the ticket, was a victim of collateral damage. Whittaker had written her a check for $44,000 and bought her house, but she was by no means a millionaire. Rumors that the state routinely paid the clerk who had sold the ticket 10% of the jackpot winnings hounded her. She was followed home from work. Threatened. Assaulted. Whittaker's car was twice broken into, by trusted acquaintances who watched him leave large amounts of cash in it. $500,000 and $200,000 were stolen in two separate instances. The thieves spiked Whittaker's drink with prescription drugs in the first instance. The second incident was the handiwork of his granddaughter's friends, who had been probing the girl for details on Whittaker's cash for weeks. Even Whittaker's good-faith generosity was questioned. When he offered $10,000 to improve the city's water park so that it was more handicap accessible, locals complained that he spent more money at the strip club. (Amusingly this was true). Whittaker invested quite a bit in his own businesses, tripled the number of people his businesses employed (making him one of the larger employers in the area) and eventually had given away $14 million to charity through a foundation he set up for the purpose. This is, of course, what you are "supposed" to do. Set up a foundation. Be careful about your charity giving. It made no difference in the end. To top it all off, Whittaker had been accused of ruining a number of marriages. His money made other men look inferior, they said, wherever he went in the small West Virginia town he called home. Resentment grew quickly. And festered. Whittaker paid four settlements related to this sort of claim. Yes, you read that right. Four. His family and their immediate circle were quickly the victims of odds-defying numbers of overdoses, emergency room visits and even fatalities. His granddaughter, the eighteen year old "Brandi" (who Whittaker had been giving a $2100.00 per week allowance) was found dead after having been missing for several weeks. Her death was, apparently, from a drug overdose, but Whittaker suspected foul play. Her body had been wrapped in a tarp and hidden behind a rusted-out van. Her seventeen year old boyfriend had expired three months earlier in Whittaker's vacation house, also from an overdose. Some of his friends had robbed the house after his overdose, stepping over his body to make their escape and then returning for more before stepping over his body again to leave. His parents sued for wrongful death claiming that Whittaker's loose purse strings contributed to their son's death. Amazingly, juries are prone to award damages in cases such as these. Whittaker settled. Again. Even before the deaths, the local and state police had taken a special interest in Whittaker after his new-found fame. He was arrested for minor and less minor offenses many times after his winnings, despite having had a nearly spotless record before the award. Whittaker's high profile couldn't have helped him much in this regard. In 18 months Whittaker had been cited for over 250 violations ranging from broken tail lights on every one of his five new cars, to improper display of renewal stickers. A lawsuit charging various police organizations with harassment went nowhere and Whittaker was hit with court costs instead. Whittaker's wife filed for divorce, and in the process froze a number of his assets and the accounts of his operating companies. Caesars in Atlantic City sued him for $1.5 million to cover bounced checks, caused by the asset freeze. Today Whittaker is badly in debt, and bankruptcy looms large in his future. But, hey, that's just one example, right? Wrong. Nearly one third of multi-million dollar jackpot winners eventually declare bankruptcy. Some end up worse. To give you just a taste of the possibilities, consider the fates of:
Billie Bob Harrell, Jr.: $31 million. Texas, 1997. As of 1999: Committed suicide in the wake of incessant requests for money from friends and family. “Winning the lottery is the worst thing that ever happened to me.
William âBudâ Post: $16.2 million. Pennsylvania. 1988. In 1989: Brother hires a contract murderer to kill him and his sixth wife. Landlady sued for portion of the jackpot. Convicted of assault for firing a gun at a debt collector. Declared bankruptcy. Dead in 2006.
Evelyn Adams: $5.4 million (won TWICE 1985, 1986). As of 2001: Poor and living in a trailer gave away and gambled most of her fortune.
Suzanne Mullins: $4.2 million. Virginia. 1993. As of 2004: No assets left.
Shefik Tallmadge: $6.7 million. Arizona. 1988. As of 2005: Declared bankruptcy.
Thomas Strong: $3 million. Texas. 1993. As of 2006: Died in a shoot-out with police.
Victoria Zell: $11 million. 2001. Minnesota. As of 2006: Broke. Serving seven year sentence for vehicular manslaughter.
Karen Cohen: $1 million. Illinois. 1984. As of 2000: Filed for bankruptcy. As of 2006: Sentenced to 22 months for lying to federal bankruptcy court.
Jeffrey Dampier: $20 million. Illinois. 1996. As of 2006: Kidnapped and murdered by own sister-in-law.
Ed Gildein: $8.8 million. Texas. 1993. As of 2003: Dead. Wife saddled with his debts. As of 2005: Wife sued by her own daughter who claimed that she was taking money from a trust fund and squandering cash in Las Vegas.
Willie Hurt: $3.1 million. Michigan. 1989. As of 1991: Addicted to cocaine. Divorced. Broke. Indicted for murder.
Michael Klingebiel: $2 million. As of 1998 sued by own mother claiming he failed to share the jackpot with her.
Janite Lee: $18 million. 1993. Missouri. As of 2001: Filed for bankruptcy with $700 in assets.
So, what the hell DO you do if you are unlucky enough to win the lottery? This is the absolutely most important thing you can do right away: NOTHING. Yes. Nothing. DO NOT DECLARE YOURSELF THE WINNER yet. Do NOT tell anyone. The urge is going to be nearly irresistible. Resist it. Trust me. 1. IMMEDIATELY retain an attorney. Get a partner from a larger, NATIONAL firm. Don't let them pawn off junior partners or associates on you. They might try, all law firms might, but insist instead that your lead be a partner who has been with the firm for awhile. Do NOT use your local attorney. Yes, I mean your long-standing family attorney who did your mother's will. Do not use the guy who fought your dry-cleaner bill. Do not use the guy you have trusted your entire life because of his long and faithful service to your family. In fact, do not use any firm that has any connection to family or friends or community. TRUST me. This is bad. You want someone who has never heard of you, any of your friends, or any member of your family. Go the the closest big city and walk into one of the national firms asking for one of the "Trust and Estates" partners you have previously looked up on http://www.martindale.com from one of the largest 50 firms in the United States which has an office near you. You can look up attornies by practice area and firm on Martindale. 2. Decide to take the lump sum. Most lotteries pay a really pathetic rate for the annuity. It usually hovers around 4.5% annual return or less, depending. It doesn't take much to do better than this, and if you have the money already in cash, rather than leaving it in the hands of the state, you can pull from the capital whenever you like. If you take the annuity you won't have access to that cash. That could be good. It could be bad. It's probably bad unless you have a very addictive personality. If you need an allowance managed by the state, it is because you didn't listen to point #1 above. Why not let the state just handle it for you and give you your allowance? Many state lotteries pay you your "allowence" (the annuity option) by buying U.S. treasury instruments and running the interest payments through their bureaucracy before sending it to you along with a hunk of the principal every month. You will not be beating inflation by much, if at all. There is no reason you couldn't do this yourself, if a low single-digit return is acceptable to you. You aren't going to get even remotely the amount of the actual jackpot. Take our old friend Mr. Whittaker. Using Whittaker is a good model both because of the reminder of his ignominious decline, and the fact that his winning ticket was one of the larger ones on record. If his situation looks less than stellar to you, you might have a better perspective on how "large" your winnings aren't. Whittaker's "jackpot" was $315 million. He selected the lump-sum cash up-front option, which knocked off $145 million (or 46% of the total) leaving him with $170 million. That was then subject to withholding for taxes of $56 million (33%) leaving him with $114 million. In general, you should expect to get about half of the original jackpot if you elect a lump sum (maybe better, it depends). After that, you should expect to lose around 33% of your already pruned figure to state and federal taxes. (Your mileage may vary, particularly if you live in a state with aggressive taxation schemes). 3. Decide right now, how much you plan to give to family and friends. This really shouldn't be more than 20% or so. Figure it out right now. Pick your number. Tell your lawyer. That's it. Don't change it. 20% of $114 million is $22.8 million. That leaves you with $91.2 million. DO NOT CONSULT WITH FAMILY when deciding how much to give to family. You are going to get advice that is badly tainted by conflict of interest, and if other family members find out that Aunt Flo was consulted and they weren't you will never hear the end of it. Neither will Aunt Flo. This might later form the basis for an allegation that Aunt Flo unduly influenced you and a lawsuit might magically appear on this basis. No, I'm not kidding. I know of one circumstance (related to a business windfall, not a lottery) where the plaintiffs WON this case. Do NOT give anyone cash. Ever. Period. Just don't. Do not buy them houses. Do not buy them cars. Tell your attorney that you want to provide for your family, and that you want to set up a series of trusts for them that will total 20% of your after tax winnings. Tell him you want the trust empowered to fund higher education, some help (not a total) purchase of their first home, some provision for weddings and the like, whatever. Do NOT put yourself in the position of handing out cash. Once you do, if you stop, you will be accused of being a heartless bastard (or bitch). Trust me. It won't go well. It will be easy to lose perspective. It is now the duty of your friends, family, relatives, hangers-on and their inner circle to skew your perspective, and they take this job quite seriously. Setting up a trust, a managed fund for your family that is in the double digit millions is AMAZINGLY generous. You need never have trouble sleeping because you didn't lend Uncle Jerry $20,000 in small denomination unmarked bills to start his chain of deep-fried peanut butter pancake restaurants. ("Deep'n 'nutter Restaurants") Your attorney will have a number of good ideas how to parse this wealth out without turning your siblings/spouse/children/grandchildren/cousins/waitresses into the latest Paris Hilton. 4. You will be encouraged to hire an investment manager. Considerable pressure will be applied. Don't. Investment managers charge fees, usually a percentage of assets. Consider this: If they charge 1% (which is low, I doubt you could find this deal, actually) they have to beat the market by 1% every year just to break even with a general market index fund. It is not worth it, and you don't need the extra return or the extra risk. Go for the index fund instead if you must invest in stocks. This is a hard rule to follow. They will come recommended by friends. They will come recommended by family. They will be your second cousin on your mother's side. Investment managers will sound smart. They will have lots of cool acronyms. They will have nice PowerPoint presentations. They might (MIGHT) pay for your shrimp cocktail lunch at TGI Friday's while reminding you how poor their side of the family is. They live for this stuff. You should smile, thank them for their time, and then tell them you will get back to them next week. Don't sign ANYTHING. Don't write it on a cocktail napkin (lottery lawsuit cases have been won and lost over drunkenly scrawled cocktail napkin addition and subtraction figures with lots of zeros on them). Never call them back. Trust me. You will thank me later. This tactic, smiling, thanking people for their time, and promising to get back to people, is going to have to become familiar. You will have to learn to say no gently, without saying the word "no." It sounds underhanded. Sneaky. It is. And its part of your new survival strategy. I mean the word "survival" quite literally. Get all this figured out BEFORE you claim your winnings. They aren't going anywhere. Just relax. 5. If you elect to be more global about your paranoia, use between 20.00% and 33.00% of what you have not decided to commit to a family fund IMMEDIATELY to purchase a combination of longer term U.S. treasuries (5 or 10 year are a good idea) and perhaps even another G7 treasury instrument. This is your safety net. You will be protected... from yourself. You are going to be really tempted to starting being a big investor. You are going to be convinced that you can double your money in Vegas with your awesome Roulette system/by funding your friend's amazing idea to sell Lemming dung/buying land for oil drilling/by shorting the North Pole Ice market (global warming, you know). This all sounds tempting because "Even if I lose it all I still have $XX million left! Anyone could live on that comfortably for the rest of their life." Yeah, except for 33% of everyone who won the lottery. You're not going to double your money, so cool it. Let me say that again. You're not going to double your money, so cool it. Right now, you'll get around 3.5% on the 10 year U.S. treasury. With $18.2 million (20% of $91.2 mil after your absurdly generous family gift) invested in those you will pull down $638,400 per year. If everything else blows up, you still have that, and you will be in the top 1% of income in the United States. So how about you not fuck with it. Eh? And that's income that is damn safe. If we get to the point where the United States defaults on those instruments, we are in far worse shape than worrying about money. If you are really paranoid, you might consider picking another G7 or otherwise mainstream country other than the U.S. according to where you want to live if the United States dissolves into anarchy or Britney Spears is elected to the United States Senate. Put some fraction in something like Swiss Government Bonds at 3%. If the Swiss stop paying on their government debt, well, then you know money really means nothing anywhere on the globe anymore. I'd study small field sustainable agriculture if you think this is a possibility. You might have to start feedng yourself. 6. That leaves, say, 80% of $91.2 million or $72.9 million. Here is where things start to get less clear. Personally, I think you should dump half of this, or $36.4 million, into a boring S&P 500 index fund. Find something with low fees. You are going to be constantly tempted to retain "sophisticated" advisers who charge "nominal fees." Don't. Period. Even if you lose every other dime, you have $638,400 per year you didn't have before that will keep coming in until the United States falls into chaos. Fuck advisers and their fees. Instead, drop your $36.4 million in the market in a low fee vehicle. Unless we have an unprecedented downturn the likes of which the United States has never seen, should return around 7.00% or so over the next 10 years. You should expect to touch not even a dime of this money for 10 or 15 or even 20 years. In 20 years $36.4 million could easily become $115 million. 7. So you have put a safety net in place. You have provided for your family beyond your wildest dreams. And you still have $36.4 million in "cash." You know you will be getting $638,400 per year unless the capital building is burning, you don't ever need to give anyone you care about cash, since they are provided for generously and responsibly (and can't blow it in Vegas) and you have a HUGE nest egg that is growing at market rates. (Given the recent dip, you'll be buying in at great prices for the market). What now? Whatever you want. Go ahead and burn through $36.4 million in hookers and blow if you want. You've got more security than 99% of the country. A lot of it is in trusts so even if you are sued your family will live well, and progress across generations. If your lawyer is worth his salt (I bet he is) then you will be insulated from most lawsuits anyhow. Buy a nice house or two, make sure they aren't stupid investments though. Go ahead and be an angel investor and fund some startups, but REFUSE to do it for anyone you know. (Friends and money, oil and water - Michael Corleone) Play. Have fun. You earned it by putting together the shoe sizes of your whole family on one ticket and winning the jackpot.
I'm a graphic designer located in Indiana who is creating a grocery ad for a client who's store is in Illinois. He is wanting me to put "COME GAMBLE WITH US" and then list the hours of his store. He has slot machines on location. My question is, is this type of advertising legal? The advertisement will be printed on newsprint and inserted into the paper. Google search is getting me no where. There seems to be a lot of gray areas concerning gambling advertisements. Thanks in advance!
A Timeline of a Different Cold War - The Heir Apparent: The Legacy of Henry Wallace
(This is work in progress) Hope you enjoy inventive timelines ;) The Heir Apparent: The Legacy of Henry Wallace US and Soviet Leaders Cold War Circa 2016 Cosmonaut Alexei Leonov, 1st Man on the Moon July 19-21, 1944: Under pressure from FDR, and the re-energized Left in the party, the DNC relents and Henry Wallace is renominated as Roosevelt’s VP for 1944 General Election. July 21, 1944 - The United States military begins to retake the island of Guam after Japanese troops had occupied the island during World War II. The battle would end on August 10. November 6, 1944 - The last campaign speech of Franklin D. Roosevelt, seeking his fourth term in office, is broadcast from his Hyde Park, New York home. One day later, Roosevelt would gain that fourth term by a significant, but smaller margin than any of his previous elections, especially in the popular vote where Thomas Dewey lost by only three and one half million votes. The Electoral College margin, however, at 399 to 132, ensured Roosevelt good footing in the final prosecution of World War II. December 18, 1944 - The United States Supreme Court rules in the case of Korematsu vs. the United States, the wartime internment of Japanese Americans on the West Coast was valid during a time of war. 1945 February 4-11, 1945 - President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, and Premier Josef Stalin hold the Yalta Conference in the Soviet Union to discuss post-war Europe. Stalin meets with VP Henry Wallace many times during the conference, with FDR's health clearly failing, Stalin comes to believe that Wallace is someone that will be just as accomodating as FDR, if not more. FDR & Wallace want to prioritize the Pacific Theater and agree with Stalin to halt at the Wessen River in exchange for full Soviet commitment to routing the Japanese from the Asian mainland. This works out greatly to the benefit of the Soviet post-war position. February 19, 1945 - Thirty thousand United States Marines land on Iwo Jima. March 1, 1945 - American troops cross the Rhine River at Remagen, Germany. Two weeks later, on March 18, twelve hundred and fifty U.S. bombers attack Berlin, causing Adolf Hitler to announce the destruction of his own industries and military installations one day later in preparation for invasion. US forces advance eastward until they halted at the Wesser River as agreed at Yalta. April 1, 1945 - American troops invade Okinawa, beginning the Battle of Okinawa, which would continue until June 21. April 12, 1945 - President Roosevelt dies suddenly; Vice President Henry Wallace assumes the presidency and role as commander in chief for the duration of World War II. May 2, 1945 – The Red Army captures Berlin following the suicide of Hitler and other Nazi leaders in a secret bunker. The Werhmacht continues fighting the Red Army east of the Wesser River. May 17, 1945 - Wehrmacht High Command surrenders after their lines collapse allowing the Soviets to advance to the River Wesser. Soviet and US allies meet at Wilhelm Kaisen bridge in Bremen and fraternize with each other in celebration. May 21, 1945 - The unconditional surrender of Germany at Reims, France concludes the military engagements of World War II in Europe. It is accepted by General Dwight D. Eisenhower in his role as the commander of Allied troops in the European theater of the war. July 5, 1945 - In a surpise landslide, Labor wins the UK election. Despite the popularity of Churchill as a leader, the electorate did not want the Tories in charge of the recovery as they were for the previous depression recovery. President Wallace reaffirms America's special relationship with the UK and welcomes the renewed shift to the left. July 16, 1945 - The first atomic bomb, the Trinity Test, is exploded at Alamogordo, New Mexico, after its production at Los Alamos. August 2, 1945 - The Potsdam Conference concludes with the UK rather sidelined and the US, represented by Wallace, largely indifferent to Soviet expansion. The biggest change from Yalta, was the the abandonment of seperate zones of control for Berlin and Vienna while retaining the zones for Germany as a whole. Wallace was mosty focused on ensuring full Soviet cooperation with other allies regarding empowering the Allied Control Commission to make systemic changes in Germany. Within 5 years Germany would become more agrarian and lose most heavy manfucaturing capacity in favor of light manufacturing. Most significantly Potsdam established Denazification and the War Crimes Tribunal at Nuremburg. August 6, 1945 - After much debate with the top brass, President Henry Wallace refuses to give the go-ahead for the use of the atomic bomb, citing such devastation would only harden the Japanese will to resist. He is also keen to keep the Soviets from discovering America’s atomic weapons project for both diplomatic and national security reasons. Operation Downfall is initiated instead as the official war plan to force the Japanese surrender by invasion of their home islands. https://preview.redd.it/o2ae4vk2nps41.jpg?width=1100&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7eaa99954176e85336550eba11c7dbd40fc63520 September 4, 1945 – Soviet forces capture Sakhalin and Kuril Islands, and then commit their forces to pushing remnant Japanese forces out of Manchuria. Communist movements greatly benefit from Soviet patronage in Korea and China. September 19, 1945 - Thomas G. Corcoran is narrowly confirmed a justice of the Supreme Court by the Senate. October 4, 1945 - The Soviets begin a secret atomic weapons program of their own after discovering the success of the US atomic bomb project through the spy operation of Julius Rosenberg, Klaus Fuchs and David Greenglass. It would be decades before knowledge of the spy ring in the US would come to light. October 30, 1945 - Soviets recruit Wernher von Braun and nearly a thousand other engineers and scientists into the Soviet rocket program greatly benefiting their long-sustained lead in the future Space Race. November 14, 1945 – Operation Olympic begins with the invasion of Kyushu from the south coast by forces staged in Okinawa. Despite massive preparatory bombardment, the landings becomes the most deadly battle yet for American forces in WW2. Near total casualty rate is reported for the first wave of American troops. 1946 January 3, 1946 – Second Phase of Olympic is executed with a smaller invasion of the island of Shikoku. Aerial bombardment, staged from Kyushu and the fleet, intensifies across Japan. January 10, 1946 - The first meeting of the United Nations general assembly occurs after its founding on October 24, 1945 by fifty-one nations, including the Security Council nations of China, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the U.S.A. March 18, 1946 – Operation Coronet begins with the amphibious invasion of the Kanto plain and setting the Siege of Tokyo. Concurrently, US forces invade the Honshu coast from Kyushu and Shikoku. June 6, 1946 - The Basketball Association of America, known as the National Basketball Association (NBA) since 1949 after its merger with the rival National Basketball League, is founded. June 12, 1946 – Tokyo falls to US forces. Soviet forces invade Hokkaido as US forces fight northward against hold-outs. June 20, 1946 - Wallace's second appointment to the Supreme Court, Fred M. Vinson, enjoyed more support in the Senate, thanks to majority leader Harry S. Truman for appealing to the center of the Democratic Party. July 4, 1946 - The island nation of the Philippines is given their independence by the United States. This ends four hundred and twenty-five years of dominance by the west. 1947 February 24, 1947 – Japan surrenders to the US by order of Emperor Hirohito, in return for protection, fearing Soviet control of a Post-War Japan. Days later US and Soviet forces meet at the 38th parallel and exchange diplomatic courtesies. Japan is divided by two occupation governments, Soviet-occupied "North Japan" (called the Democratic Republic of Japan) and US-Occupied "South" Japan. 190,000 Americans died in the battle. Millions of Japanese died during the fighting and resulting famines and guerilla insurgency during the post-war occupation. March 1, 1947 - The Atomic Energy Commission is established. March 12, 1947 - The Wallace Doctrine is announced to the U.S. Congress. When passed it would grant $700 million in humanitarian aid to liberal or socialist democracies. President Henry Wallace implements the act on May 22. During the bill signing ceremony, President Wallace argued for cooperation—not cold war—with the Soviet Union, setting the future course of US-Soviet diplomatic relations. April 15, 1947 - Jackie Robinson breaks Major League Baseball's barrier against colored players when he debuts at first base for Branch Rickey's Brooklyn Dodgers. June 5, 1947 - Secretary of State George C. Marshall proposes aid extension to all European nations for war recovery, known as the Marshall Plan, which would lead to Congressional approval of $14 billion over the following four years. June 20, 1947 – Democrats in Congress, rallied by President Wallace, vote down the Taft-Hartley Labor Act that would have curbed strikes and sectoral collective bargaining. December 30, 1947 - King Michael I, a westernized monarch, was forced to abdicate his throne at gunpoint by communist partisans. Romania was thereafter declared a socialist republic. 1948 January 1, 1948 - Five hundred thousand mine workers begin to strike, with other industries following their lead in solidarity, particularly the Railroad. This was a result of built up grievances that were suppressed by the wartime “No-Strike Pledge”. Wallace responds days later with an order to nationalize the nation’s iron and coal mines and then implement worker demands. April 1, 1948 - US convinced UK to make assurances that the decision to replace the Reichsmark would be quashed after a diplomatic row erupted with the USSR that threatened the post-war cooperative order. The German debt crisis will remain acute for the next decade. Despite earlier threats by the Soviets the West-East German border remains open. April 30, 1948 - The Organization of American States is founded by twenty-one nations to provide a mutual development pact after World War II. Founding nations were Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the United States, Uruguay, and Venezuela. May 15, 1948 - Arab-Israeli War commence after the declaration of independece by Israel. June 2, 1948 - President Wallaces decision to nationalize coal and iron mines is ruled legal by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 decision, Peabody Coal Co vs US, expanding eminent domain power for "national security" purposes. June 19, 1948 - Josip Broz Tito breaks with Moscow over growing Soviet interference over the Yugoslavian Communist Party. This tests the post-war unity amongst socialist nations and the USSR by starting the Non-Aligned Movement. July 26, 1948 - Executive Order 9976, ending segregation in the United States military and federal civil service, is signed into effect by President Henry Wallace to the anger of many Southern Democrats. August 12, 1948 - Infighting between Irgun and Soviet-backed partisans collapses the Ben-Guirion coaltion, and divides the IDF forces into separate militia factions. This causes the Israelis much delay in countering the Arab incursion. November 2, 1948 - President Henry Wallace, and his VP Rexford Tugwell, rallies from behind, capturing his first president election from the presumptive winner Thomas E. Dewey, the governor of New York. Headlines in national newspapers had overtly announced a Dewey victory, only to be proven wrong. Wallace won the Electoral College vote with 283 to Dewey's 200, with Strom Thurmond, running as the States' Rights candidate, receiving 48 Electoral votes. Wallace won the election with 50.1% of the popular votes. Wallace, in contrast to Dewey, saw unchecked private wealth as a threat to liberty. The “common man,” he argued, must “have the opportunity to form unions and bargain through them collectively.” Citing “Herr Thyssen, the wealthy German steel man” who “gave Hitler enough money to enable him to play on the minds of the German people,” Wallace warned of “wealthy men who sincerely believe that their wealth is likely to be safer if they can hire tyrants who lure the people back into slavery.” Much throughout his campaign Wallace resisted Dewey's call for an American dominated post-war world order to counter the communist philosophy of the Soviet Union. Wallace's election was a rebuke to the concept of "American Exceptionalism". The implication was that global progress would flow from a partnership of nations, each of which boasted traditions of liberty, rather than domination by an America that would, as Wallace put it, “mold the world for such purposes as we see fit and by such means as we see fit.” “Some have spoken of the ‘American century,’” he noted in his victory speech, but “I say that the century on which we are entering—the century which will come into being after this war—can be and must be the Century of the Common Man.” December 15, 1948 - Alger Hiss, former State Department official, is indicted for perjury in connection to denials of passing state secrets to a communist spy ring. He would later be found not guilty in January 1950. It was perceived by the general public to be a partisan swipe at the Wallace administration. 1949 January 5, 1949 - The 1st Indo-Pakistani War concludes in a stalemate with Kasmir divided along the Line of Control. January 8, 1949 - Council for Mutual Economic Assistance is founded by the Soviet Union to aid European nations still recovering from World War II to develop infrastructure, this is the Soviet response to the Marshall plan and generates much support among left-wing parties in Western Europe. February 9, 1949 - The last confirmed resistance militia in Japan was defeated after a battle with US soldiers. This ends the small insurgency by Shintaisei diehards against US forces occupying Japan. March 2, 1949 - Captain James Gallagher lands the B-50 Lucky Lady II in Texas after completing the first around-the-world non-stop airplane flight. It was refueled four times in flight. April 2, 1949 - The United Nations Security Council unanimously approves the trusteeship of Pacific Islands formerly controlled by Japan to the United States. https://preview.redd.it/6bpwdlkxyws41.png?width=4592&format=png&auto=webp&s=a4fd1c29fb33f1bdb3067f5246f4d0a8fee85ce9 April 4, 1949 - ETO, the European Treaty Organization, is formed by the ten Western European nations (Belgium, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal). The treaty stated that any attack against one nation would be considered an attack against them all. Henry Wallace refuses to commit the US to a “post-war, Eurocentric, military alliance” and denounces it as a unnecessary provocation toward our Soviet allies. May 8, 1949 - A stalemate ends the Arab-Israeli War, despite an energenic Israeli counter-offensive that regained control over most of the Jewish Mandate borders and the Gaza Strip. Much of Arab Palastine including the entire West Bank is annexed by Trans-Jordan and Lebanon. The USSR has gained much clout with both nations due to its generous aid during the war. August 18, 1949 - Due to his impressive record at Nuremburg, and commitment to desegregation and racial justice as Attorney General, the Senate soundly confirms Henry Wallace's 3rd nominee, Francis Biddle, to the Supreme Court. August 29, 1949 - the Soviet Union secretly conducted its first successful atomic weapon test in Kazahkstan. Stalin decides that this must be kept a secret to ensure good diplomatic relations with the United States. September 22, 1949 - Mao Zedong's Communists are victorious over the Koumintang in the Chinese Civil War and the People's Republic of China is founded on October 1st. The US, UK and France refuse to recognize the People's Republic, and despite Soviet protest, the Republic of China will retain its seat on the UN Security Council indefinitely. October 4, 1949 - Earl Warren is appointed to Supreme Court by President Wallace after the death of Justice Rutledge. October 7, 1949 - Tokyo Rose, the femme fatale of Japanese war broadcasts, is sentenced to ten years in prison. She would be paroled in 1956 and pardoned in 1977. October 14, 1949 - Eleven leaders of the United States Communist party are convicted of advocating a violent insurrection and overthrow of the U.S. government. The Supreme Court would overturn the convictions 6-3 on June 4, 1951. October 16, 1949 - In a stunning reversal of fortunes, thanks to generous aid and support by the Soviet Army, the Communist Party of Greece wins the Greek Civil War. Markos Vafeiadis establishes the Democratic Hellenic Republic and purges the monarchy and royal family. This encourages Turkey to pursue closer ties with the West and actively surpress communist influence at home. November 1, 1949 – President Wallace signs into law a program, modeled after the Montgomery G.I. Bill, to provide college tuition to any person who has been accepted to an accredited public university or trade school. World of 1950 1950 January 14, 1950 - The United States recalls all consular officials from China after the seizure of the American consul general in Peking by communists. The Soviet Union intervenes diplomatically on behalf of the US to guarantee the safety of US citizens. January 17, 1950 - The Brinks robbery in Boston occurs when eleven masked bandits steal $2.8 million from an armored car outside their express office. April 1, 1950 – After President Wallace signed the Medicare Act into law, the US began implementing its first national health insurance program guaranteeing medical coverage for all Americans, subject to added premiums for wealthier citizens. June 8, 1950 - Swedish scientists detect abnormal radioactivity in air samples, when shared with US government scientists the DOD begins to suspect that the USSR has been actively testing atomic weapons. This assessment is made Top Secret by the president and not released to the public until decades later. 1951 February 28, 1951 - Preliminary report from the Senator Estes Kefauver investigation that had begun in May 1950 into organized crime is issued, stating that gambling take was in excess of $20 billion per year. Estes Kefauver spurred a renewed effort at combating the Mafia by passing new federal racketeering and forfeiture laws. April 16, 1951 - The Fair Labor Standards Act is expanded by congress to require overtime pay for work performed on federal holidays and also establishes election day as a paid federal holiday. September 6, 1951 – President Wallace hosts Josef Stalin at the White House for the first ever state visit by a Soviet leader to the United States. The meeting was heavily criticized by Republicans as a tacit acceptance of global communism. October 25, 1951 - Labor holds their majority in the UK parliment after snap elections, President Wallace made a public endorsement for Clement Attlee and his Labor Party and their platform of economic justice. Labor will hold this majority until 1970. 1952 February 14, 1952 - The 1952 Winter Olympics open in Helsinki, Finland with thirty participating nations. During these games, the first triple jump in figure skating history is performed by Dick Button, who won one of the four gold medals gained by U.S. athletes. April 8, 1952 - President Wallace authorizes the nationalization of US steel mills in order to avert economic disruption by a another strike. Opponents deride Wallace as a “Socialist Tyrant”. July 18, 1952 - Congress founds the National Airlines as a public-owned monopoly on commercial air service. Smaller air companies can still contract with the National Airlines to fill gaps in essential services between small airports. Air traffic control and airport ownership also fall under federal ownership. September 4, 1952 - The inauguration of trans-continental television occurs with the broadcast of President Wallace's speech at the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference in San Francisco. The treaty would be signed on September 8 by the U.S., Japan, and forty-seven other nations. The conditions of the treaty allow the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy to continue within limits as counterweight to the Japanese People’s Army (JPA). The parties also sign the US-Japan Mutual Defense Pact assuring South Japan that the US will provide a defense gaurentee against any agression by the Communist North. It also preserves the Imperial Family’s role in government. November 1, 1952 - At Eniwetok Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, a larger atomic bomb, named Able, is exploded. US atomic weapons continue to remain a secret to the general public and the vast majority of nations. November 4, 1952 - General Dwight D. Eisenhower, popular due to his role in winning World War II as European commander, turns down an offer to be the Republican nominee. President Wallace announces that he will run for a third and final term in office, as the recently passed 25th amendment doesn't apply to the current president. Henry Wallace remains as extremely popular as his predecessor and eventually trounces Robert A Taft, securing an mandate for a third expansion of the New Deal and continued peace with the Soviet Union. The Electoral College vote was 349 to 182. 1953 June 5, 1953 – The first federal public education funding program is passed and signed into law. The Act will create block grants to support poor primary and secondary schools and provides extensive funding for science education. June 17, 1953 - Food shortages, pay cuts and tensions over Soviet occupation lead to riots across East Germany. The uprising is swiftly put down by Soviet troops. July 23, 1953 - Gamal Abdel Nasser takes power in a coup in Egypt and his Pan-Arab movement aligns itself with the Soviet Union after accepting foreign aid. July 24, 1953 – The Atoms for Peace initiative begins to improve atomic power technology for civilian use by researching powerful atomic batteries, developing an emission-free nuclear energy economy, and improving agriculture through radiation-based gene manipulation. Henry Wallace successfully lobbied Congress to fund his initiative and to pass a law to indemnify atomic power plants leading to the Atomic Industrial Revolution in America. August 19, 1953 - Operation Ajax is presented to Wallace and he admonishes the intelligence community for even suggesting something so damaging to US foreign policy. Mossadegh is not overthrown and continues to rule Iran on a social-democratic platform. October 30, 1953 - President Henry Wallace approves a bill to reduce the size of the US military by 30% and to reduce naval tonnage in half. President Wallace also decided to secretly end US atomic weapons production by executive order. US stockpile was about 430 warheads. December 30, 1953 - The first color televisions go on sale. 1954 January 26, 1954 - Bell Labs discontinues research into transistors in favor of miniturizing vacuum tubes and developing atomic-derived portable power sources. February 23, 1954 - The first large scale vaccination of children against polio begins in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. March 4, 1954 - Henry Wallace appoints Senator Estes Kefauver as Justice to replace the late Justice Vinson, and is confirmed by his colleagues. May 17, 1954 - Racial segregation in public schools is declared unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court in Brown vs. the Board of Education. The ruling of the court stated that racial segregation violated the 14th Amendment's clause that guaranteed equal protection. The Monroe School in Topeka, Kansas had segregated Linda Brown in its classes. July 18, 1954 - After protracted legal disputes with medical providers threatening to undermine the Medicare system, Henry Wallace rallies Congress to give him the power to nationalize for-profit hospitals under the National Health System. August 19, 1954 - Another series of protracted disputes resulting from the Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Wisconsin case, which upheld federal price controls on oil and gas producers, the oil companies collude to restrict production and instigate lock-outs. This was met with an Act of Congress authorizing President Wallace to nationalize the oil and gas industry. September 8, 1954 - In Bangkok, Thailand, the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization is formed by the U.S., Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, France, the Philippines, Pakistan, and Thailand, creating a mutual defense pact against Red China. In 1954, Ray Kroc founds the idea for the McDonald's corporation, agreeing to franchise the idea of Dick and Mac McDonald, who had started the first McDonald's restaurant in 1940 and had eight restaurants by 1954. Kroc would incorporate the entity on March 2, 1955 and open his first franchise on April 15 in Des Plaines, Illinois. He would buy out the McDonald's brothers in 1961.
The new Illinois Gambling Act of 2019 allows online sports betting in Illinois, although it does not legalize other types of online casino games or online poker. Since 2012, the Illinois Lottery has provided residents and visitors to play Powerball, Mega Millions and other games from their computers or mobile devices. Depending on the state, certain types of gambling are illegal and prosecuted under criminal statute. However, many states have relaxed their gambling laws and allowed casinos and other gambling venues. While Illinois gambling laws allow betting on horse racing and riverboat casinos, most other types of gambling are prohibited in the state. The minimum age requirement for gambling in Illinois is set at 21 years. Users go through age verification processes, and complying with the law is mandatory. Illinois has the same legal age requirement as the majority of the United States. The restriction when it comes to minimum gaming age applies to all games. Online gambling in Illinois is legal for certain types of gambling products. Residents can play the Illinois Lottery online. Furthermore, new Illinois gambling laws were introduced in 2019, which make it legal to bet on sports online. Illinois is in the eastern section of the Midwest United States. It borders numerous states – Kentucky, Missouri, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Indiana – and it even touches on Lake Michigan. State Motto: State sovereignty, national union. Quite a bit of gambling happens legally in Illinois. Gambling is a class A misdemeanor offense in the State of Illinois, but not all gambling is illegal in Illinois. State-approved forms of gambling are legal. Illinois gambling laws do not distinguish between a game of skill and a game of chance. It has been upheld by Illinois courts that Texas Hold ’em poker is gambling. Other Illinois ... Is Online Gambling Legal in Illinois? Illinois law makes it clear that any operation of an online casino from within the state’s border is illegal and considered a misdemeanor. However, if you are caught playing on an online casino site, only the operator gets punished, and you would be free of any charges. Is real money online gambling legal in IL? Yes, there are no regulations prohibiting Illinois residents from playing on offshore sites, which means that this form of gambling is perfectly legal. Which offshore gambling sites accept IL residents? There are no restrictions for Illinois-based gamblers when it comes to joining offshore iGaming sites. Illinois has not shown an appetite for prosecuting players who visit offshore gambling sites, but there is some legal risk. Additionally, offshore gambling sites are completely unregulated, and players have no recourse if they suspect an unfair game or are refused payment of winnings.
Illinois politicians in recent years have saddled our state with a series of serious evils, among them being taxpayer-funded abortion, same-sex marriage, and... Our Community Guidelines and policies apply to all YouTube content and define what you can and cannot do on YouTube. Illinois slot machine casino gambling consists of ten commercial casinos, two proposed casinos, and VLT electronic gaming machines at 7,710 local businesses ... Welcome to Everyday Law TV -- the show that demystifies the law for you and your family! In every episode, we will address the legal issues that affect you i... Illinois Signs Road Situations Practice Test Thank you for watching the video 'Illinois Signs Road Situations Practice Test' with DMV Permit Test channel. Please subscribe if you like our videos ... After sports betting record, some Illinois lawmakers want to add college sports to legal bets CBS 2's Derrick Blakley reports on attempts by state lawamakers to get casinos in Chicago and other cities. Chuck Goudie and the I-Team look at New Jersey?s challenge of a federal law banning most sports gambling in U.S. and how it could open the door for other sta... Illinois lawmakers have wrapped up their spring session after a whirlwind week that produced a budget, more gambling, legalized marijuana use, protections fo... VSiN's own expert Josh Appelbaum discusses the launch of sports betting in Michigan and Illinois which makes 1/3 of American states now with legal sports bet...