Chief Stipe

How do you define oncourse betting with today's technology? LOL thinking about it a savvy club with a young techo geek could easily rort the system.

I assume when you say Traditionally you mean when there were no means of betting other than the oncourse Tote?

In my opinion you are now presenting a different issue. I don't think there is any disagreement that the availability or rather utilisation of turf tracks and programming of meetings in the South Island is stuffed. What they may be trying to do is force trainers to use the AWT at Riccarton to improve its utilisation and therefore increase revenue but what they are doing is the exact opposite. Creating more opportunities outside of the AWT would most likely increase the AWT utilisation. Effectively though we have a downward spiral in a flat spin! I must bump the debate we had on BOAY about the Riccarton AWT Business case. One of the main Riccarton protagonists and supporter of the AWT @Pitman posted figures that the AWT was going to produced hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue through training alone. It hasn't happened - what has happened maintenance wasn't kept up, a serious problem emerged and now we have NZTR subsidising the upkeep of the AWT's!!!

And looking at the trackwork reports which is just a snapshot of activity many trainers ARE using the AWT at Cambridge. My point is you can't lump the 3 AWT's together. There has been a disparity in maintenance at each of them that seems to correlate to resourcing and thus the outcome is in simplistic terms - the lower the resourcing, the less maintenance leading to less utilisation.

Are trainers training on the Riccarton AWT? Cambridge seems to be going gang busters. Is the Riccarton AWT being maintained properly?

There are a lot of errors on the website which in some cases seem to be residual from old development and no longer used. The website is a memory hog and they still use Cloudflare as a CDN probably via Spark so there are latency issues with some parts of the site. They haven't performance enhanced it at all.

Many of the owners of the horses mistreated are from the "who's who" of Racing. Some have made it to the races which I think is a reflection of the resilience of the horses involved.

It looks like the TAB website is using Google adserver to deliver banner advertising on the website and/or are using Google Tag Manager to record user activity e.g. when you click on a TAB ad that will be collected by the TAB's Google Analytics Account. The error you see may be a number of things. One could be your internet connection is a bit flakely or the bandwidth throttled down and so when the ads are served up from a different source the response times between your browser and the adserver aren't quick enough and throws an error.

View From The Eighth Pole: An Obligation To Horse Racing - Paulick Report paulickreport.com He told you so. Thirty-one years ago, Thoroughbred owner and breeder, John Ed Anthony, predicted what would happen if racetracks joined up with casinos. “In the same location, under the same ownership and management, either casino gambling or live racing will die,” Anthony said, “and we know which it will be. “Casinos are our competition – poison to racing,” he added, calling them “the greatest threat to our industry in modern history.” Anthony made those remarks at the 1994 Jockey Club Round Table on Matters Pertaining to Racing in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. This was before casino gambling or slot machines became prevalent at many racetracks throughout North America. In the wake of efforts by Belinda Stronach and her 1/ST Racing company to pass a law in Florida allowing Gulfstream Park to end live racing while keeping their slot machine license, Anthony is frustrated that his prediction is beginning to come true. He worries that Florida will be just the first domino to fall if decoupling legislation passes in the Sunshine State. Companion Decoupling Bill Passes Florida Senate Committee 5-2 “Casinos have been wonderful for racing – the revenue sharing has been the lifeblood of purses – but it doesn't take a very smart fella to understand that racing is a whole lot more trouble than a casino and not nearly as lucrative,” he said. “And now we're being discarded. I can't think of how to combat it, other than to argue the point that they used racing to get their licenses, and now they're discarding racing. “The facts are that the tracks used pari-mutuel wagering and the logic of having gambling in the states as a catalyst to get their casinos,” he said. “And now, as projected, you're beginning to see the separation – now that they have the casino licenses, they don't need racing anymore.” Anthony worried in 1994 that many racetracks would add casinos with good intentions and then be bought out by casino companies. “How long will live racing exist when Vegas corporations own the tracks?” he said. Even if the tracks weren’t sold to gaming companies, Anthony said during his Round Table speech, racing would suffer. “Most available capital will be invested in the construction and development of casinos,” he predicted. “This will inevitably result in the decline of racing facilities.” While that may be true at many “racinos” in operation today, he said that is not the case at the Cella family’s Oaklawn Park in Anthony’s home state of Arkansas. “The Cellas are certainly the exception to the rule,” he said. “The writing is on the wall,” he said. “If Gulfstream can do what they want to do, the die is cast. I think there will be a surge of similar moves.” In his Round Table speech, Anthony said the move toward casinos would cause horse racing “significant grief,” forcing it to downsize and adjust. One comment from his talk that stood out was what Thoroughbred owners might have to do if racetracks close. “In some areas,” he said, “we may have to race in an open field and view the events from tailgates and the back-end of pickup trucks. But we will control our industry. And we will be free to go forward in ways we believe are in our best interest.” That comment is particularly relevant in connection with the potential closure of Gulfstream Park. Maybe future racing in Florida won’t take place in open fields with people watching from pickup trucks, but I can envision a more modest facility operated by a group led by horsepeople who are committed to the continuation of Thoroughbred racing. If it comes to pass that Belinda Stronach’s company succeeds in closing Gulfstream Park and keeping a casino that would have never existed without horse racing, she owes it to the sport and all who depend on it for their livelihoods to help fund and build a replacement track. And that should be the case in any other state that goes down a similar path. If horse racing played a part in getting someone a casino license, they have an obligation to horse racing. That’s my view from the eighth pole. Veteran horse racing journalist Ray Paulick launched the Paulick Report in 2008 after spending more than a quarter century covering the sport for daily and weekly publications, including Daily Racing Form, Thoroughbred Times, and Blood-Horse.

Many of the owners of the horses mistreated are from the "who's who" of Racing. Some have made it to the races which I think is a reflection of the resilience of the horses involved.

There are a few things that seem inconsistent with the testing procedures for example the variations between samples and then between times. One test decreasing then spiking 5 fold. Seems odd. But the catch all rule of zero tolerance means that very small levels represent a positive for presentation. The investigation seems to be the usual assume guilt and not investigate where the substance came from.

If you are talking the latest accounts you can't draw any conclusions because the revenue isn't related to profit from turnover. Probably the only relevant Annual accounts is the 2019 Annual Report. Sports Turnover was 26% of total turnover. $10m was paid to Sporting Organisations based on a % of turnover and betting margin earned on their respective sports. You are now saying that is $26m however we don't don't what the total turnover on fixed odds sports was. I don't disagree that Racing is taking some of the Sports Cake. Whether they are getting a fair share can only be speculated on as we don't know what the agreements are or the individual costs. I'm sure each sporting organisation has the nous to negotiate a deal that is fair to themselves and there are avenues for addressing anything untoward. Don't forget Sporting Organisations have sources of funding that Racing doesn't have. As for "bowing to my superior knowledge" there is no need to play dumb around here.

No. Never has been. Not every sport that is bet on has an NSO or an agreement with the TAB therefore any particulary profits from other sports is put back into the general fund as per the legislation. and sport. How do you know they are not getting all their profit? Again how do you know that? It is in the legislation subject to the specific clauses. Read the Act: https://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2020/0028/latest/LMS291924.html Particularly Sections - 78-82 and 65, 71-23 and 128.

As has been pointed out to you before the legislation exists for Sports to receive profit revenue from the TAB activities related to those sports. However they must have a NSO (National Sporting Organisation) to be eligible. Unless you are arguing that the surplus revenue from Sports that don't have an agreement should be shared by equally or proportionally amongst all three codes and any sport that has an agreement with the TAB. Name one Sport that doesn't have an NSO/agreement with the TAB that has significant revenue that isn't distributed to that Sport?

Well AUSTRAC in their statement of claim make a case for ENTAIN not having done enough Geo-blocking.

Yeah well MGM Resorts share prices is down 34% in the last 6 months. The share price will be under more pressure if the USA tips into a recession.

Picked up a suspension yesterday.

I know where the quote comes from but in your opinion Greg what does it mean? You seem to be inferring something but it is unclear what.

Reading the latest TABNZ annual report Jetbet is long gone. The TAB has always been a statutory entity. The Crown owns it in fact it only exists as long as the Crown permits it to.

I didn't say it was "all good" but we've all experienced one way or another the AML laws in NZ. But do you seriously think that ENTAIN would try and rort the system in NZ? Sky Casino got nailed last year. I would say unlike other acquisitions ENTAINS NZ customer database and their transactions would be quite clean. ENTAIN would be very very stupid to jeopardise their monopoly license in NZ. The AUSTRAC case if you ignore the BS journalists is at a low end of the scale compared to what AUSTRAC have taken on previously in OZ.

Not true. The difference in the AUSTRAC case is the issues indentified in their Statement of Claim had their origin with the Ladbrokes business. ENTAIN took over the NZ customer base and migrated to their online betting system those customers that have been subjected to quite thorough due diligence. There is an expectation underpinned by regulations and legislation in NZ that ANY entity dealing with large amounts of monetary transactions HAS to electronically send data to the DIA. I've had some work experience in this area and it wasn't unheard of for the data that was sent to trigger a red flag with the DIA which in the first instance notified the business and requested more information. The only way for ENTAIN to circumvent that system is to manipulate the data transfer. TABNZ still have a governance role in that respect.

I'm sorry to say but you are wrong. Under the AML/CFT legislation financial institutions, casinos, and other businesses identified as potentially vulnerable to money laundering and terrorist financing are considered reporting entities and have obligations to comply with AML/CFT regulations. These organisations have rule based software systems that create data files that are regularly exchanged with the DIA. There is no way with the TABNZ/ENTAIN turnover that they are not exchanging data. Activities that trigger compliance obligations are known as "captured activities" and have been identified by the DIA as potentially exposing businesses to the risk of money laundering and terrorist financing. Prescribed Transactions: Certain transactions, such as international wire transfers of $1,000 or more and physical cash transactions of $10,000 or more, are considered "prescribed transactions" and must be reported to the DIA. Data Exchange: The DIA requires reporting entities to exchange data related to these transactions and activities, including customer identification data, transaction details, and any information that could assist in identifying or preventing money laundering or terrorist financing.

Seriously @westbrew what major sport doesn't have a National Organisation in NZ? You are talking loose change that gets reallocated. No that's factually incorrect on a number of points. Racing does NOT own the TAB nor the platform "the totalisator". TABNZ is a statutory entity essentially owned by the Government of NZ on behalf of all New Zealanders. It has a Governance Board that does comprise members from each of the codes (will be interesting to see the legislation changes to get ride GRNZ). Fixed odds wagering on Sports in NZ is "owned" by TABNZ. It is the only NZ entity that is legislated to provide that service. Under the Racing Act TABNZ is obliged to distribute wagering revenue to sports through National Sporting Organisations. Check out Sections 78 and 79 of the Racing Act. 78Sports betting rules (1) TAB NZ may make, amend, and revoke rules providing for the establishment of a system (or systems) of sports betting, and providing for any matter relating to the conduct and operation of sports betting by TAB NZ. (2) Without limiting subsection (1), the rules— (a) may state the kinds of betting that may be undertaken; and (b) may state the circumstances in which— (i) a bet may be refunded, and when it may be retained by TAB NZ; or (ii) any fixed-odds bets may be laid off on other betting systems by TAB NZ for the purpose of limiting TAB NZ’s exposure on any particular event or events; or (iii) TAB NZ may cancel any bet; and (c) must state the amounts described in section 84(2). (3) TAB NZ must consult Sport and Recreation New Zealand before making, amending, or revoking any rules under subsection (1). (4) However, subsection (3) does not apply if TAB NZ and Sport and Recreation New Zealand agree otherwise in any particular case. (5) Rules under this section are secondary legislation (see Part 3 of the Legislation Act 2019 for publication requirements). 79Agreements with New Zealand national sporting organisations (1) TAB NZ may not conduct sports betting on any sporting event or events without the written agreement of the appropriate New Zealand national sporting organisation. (2) An agreement entered into under subsection (1) must be on the terms and conditions that are agreed between TAB NZ and the New Zealand national sporting organisation concerned, including payment to the sporting organisation, under section 82(1)(e), of revenue derived from sports betting on the event or events to which the agreement relates.

It was a percentage of turnover on the respective sport and that sport needed to have a National Organisation in order to receive the revenue. As far as I know Racing didn't directly get any of that money except that which wasn't allocated. Of course there was a contribution to overheads from Sport.

What does that mean and where did you extract it from? Source please.