Ivey and Benyamine Owe Large Amounts to Full Tilt Poker

The Full Tilt Poker account of professional poker player Phil Ivey, which was revealed this weekend, has shocked the online poker gaming community. The account clearly reveals that Phil Ivey, who was part of Team Full Tilt, received a staggering loan of $10.2 million from Full Tilt Poker from June 2009 to April 2011.

Noah Stephens-Davidowitz, the editor-in-chief of Subject: Poker, broke the story on Two Plus Two, claiming that he got the information because he sought it, and not from any source “looking to harm somebody.”

Ironically, it was Ivey who sparked off this controversy when he filed a lawsuit against Tiltware, the software provider for Full Tilt Poker, shortly after Black Friday, the day on which the US federal government cracked down on Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars, and Absolute Poker. Ivey had literally flayed Tiltware, saying that he was “deeply disappointed and embarrassed that Full Tilt players have not been paid money they are owed.” Ivey had also refrained from participating in WSOP 2011 simply because he wanted to protest against Full Tilt’s failure to refund its US poker players.

Tiltware retorted by stating that Ivey’s move to file a lawsuit is “frivolous and self-serving” and had called it a move “to further enrich himself at the expense of others.” They even revealed the shocking fact that “Mr. Ivey has been invited – and has declined – to take actions that could assist the company in these efforts, including paying back a large sum of money he owes the site.”

Based on Phil Ivey’s online poker account at Full Tilt, Stephens-Davidowitz alleges that Ivey received a loan of $10.2 million in smaller amounts of $1 million and $500k over two years. By November 2009, Ivey had repaid $3 million; and although he is recorded to have made a repayment in spring 2010, he continued receiving large sums of money, which he stopped paying back. Stephens-Davidowitz further alleges that Ivey might have repaid the debt in cash, but if he had, Titlware wouldn’t have made any reference to his debt.

The name of David Benyamine, another professional poker player on Team Full Tilt, is also involved in the controversy. According to Benyamin’s Full Tilt Poker account, he has been receiving loans from Full Tilt Poker right from 2008, and the online poker site had collected the loan from his bonuses and salary. Although Benyamine was collecting a large annual paycheck of $500k, there are no records to prove that he is totally free of debt because the poker room continued deducting large amounts from his rakeback and hourly payments.

Another shocking allegation is that Benyamine could easily withdraw $5,500 from his Full Tilt Poker account 17 days after the federal crackdown, while thousands of Full Tilt Poker players are still unable to withdraw their funds.

This news has further dampened the spirits of US online poker players who had accounts on Full Tilt Poker, especially after the Alderney Gambling Control Commission (AGCC), which recently suspended Full Tilt’s gaming licenses, has postponed its hearing to September.

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