Full Tilt Players to be Repaid!

Full Tilt players rejoice! PokerStars has finally reached a settlement agreement with the US Department of Justice which means they will purchase Full Tilt. Over the course of the next 3 years PokerStars will give up $547million to the US government in order to clear the debt that Full Tilt left behind when the online poker room had it's license revoked back in September 2011. The $547 million figure represents some of the money owed to players, but it also covers the costs of bank and wire fraud, and money laundering charges incurred by Full Tilt.

PokerStars has confirmed that the acquisition has gone ahead and that it will repay outstanding balances to both US and non-US Full Tilt players. The repayment for US players is included in the $547 million, but PokerStars have set aside an additional $184 million to repay non-US Full Tilt Poker players.

The PokerStars corporate blog post on the matter gave the following statement:

"We plan to re-open the Full Tilt site and, most importantly, we will make available all funds for players outside the U.S. within 90 days of the formal close of the deal, which will occur in the next seven days. The money paid to the US Government will in part be used to reimburse former Full Tilt Poker customers in the United States, through a remission process to be administered by the Department of Justice."
According to a statement from PokerStars, money will be made available "with no restrictions on withdrawals, within 90 days of completing this transaction".

Whilst Full Tilt as a poker platform and corporate entity is in the clear and will re-open, the principals of Full Tilt are still very much in hot water, with civil proceedings against Chris Ferguson, Howard Lederer, Rafael Furst and Ray Bitar still going ahead. Bitar and Nelson Burtnick will also still face criminal proceedings, and all of the aforementioned will never be allowed to work for PokerStars.

PokerStars' acquisition of Full Tilt will be finalised when the US Department of Justice receives the sum of $225 million - an amount that must be paid in under a week following the settlement.

We'll be keeping our players updated on the news of the acquisition and the repayment of Full Tilt players, so keep checking the RakeTheRake blog and subscribe to our email newsletter to hear more.