US could face sanctions by WTO on online gambling

A three-member WTO compliance panel decided in a 215-page decision, that Antigua and Barbuda, which has arguements that Internet gambling is a lucrative source of revenue and provides an income for hundreds of islanders should be allowed since US laws are not being fairly applied to American operations of remote betting. There are more details in the AP news article:

To avoid the penalties, the U.S. government would then have to either permit Americans to gamble over foreign-based sites or eliminate exceptions for off-track betting on horses, including over the Internet, as permitted under the 1978 Interstate Horseracing Act.

Nevertheless, it appears unlikely that the U.S. will ease access to companies with servers licensed in the nation of 80,000 people - whose legal efforts were largely bankrolled by British-owned Internet gambling operators.

The U.S. Congress caught the industry by surprise last year when it added a provision to a bill aimed at improving port security that would make it illegal for banks and credit card companies to settle payments to online gambling sites. President George Bush signed it into law on Oct. 14.

The decision closed off the most lucrative region in a market worth $15.5 billion last year. Several British-based Internet gaming companies and a handful in Europe and Australia subsequently sold off or shut down their U.S. operations, losing around 80 percent of their combined business in the process.