PartyGaming Reports Loss

Partygaming, the company behind popular Party Poker online poker site, suffered a major setback when it was forced to discontinue its operations in the United States. The online gambling company reported a half-year net loss of around $47 million despite a strong increase in the number of new customers, now up to more than 400 thousand users.

The company's $320 million in profits reported last year were virtually wiped out after the enactment of The Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act in the United States. The act criminalizes the transfer and handling of online gambling payments, which effectively made Partygaming abandon the US poker market for the meantime. The company is keeping close watch on new bills introduced in US Congress that would allow the re-entry of online gambling companies. The new bill seeks the decriminalization of online gambling and stricter licensing, regulation and taxation.

The company's revenues from their continuing businesses, disregarding the effect of the pullout from the American online poker market, rose by more than 42% to $212 million. Share prices, meanwhile, are being traded at 27 pence, an increase of 19%. Despite this increase, however, current share prices are still far from the level it once enjoyed a year ago at 155 pence per share.

Partygaming also reported that their other operations are performing strongly with a record number of new non-US subscribers have taking the firm's total user base to 403,713.