Panama Papers establish possible link to Amaya Gaming insider trading scandal

The « Panama Papers », which reveal the use of shell companies by many politicians and rich people, include possible links to the insider trading investigation involving Amaya Gaming and it’s CEO David Bazoov.

The last weekend’s release of 11.5m confidential documents belonging to Panamanian corporate service provider Mossack Fonseca, also factor to insider trading charges laid against Amaya Gaming CEO David Bazoov last month by Quebec securities regulator AMF, which prompted him to announce that he was taking an indefinite leave of absence. In fact, among the companies listed by the “Panama Papers” is Zhapa Holdings Inc, a British Virgin Islands business, whose main client is listed as IFM Network, a company based in Amaya’s corporate home of Montreal, Quebec. Among Zhapa’s listed shareholders are Goulissa Baazov and Josh Bazoov, sister and brother of David Bazoov and Isam Mansour, one the the 13 individuals whose stock trading privileges were revoked by the AMF after it identified suspicious trading patterns related to multiple Amaya business transactions dating back to 2010.

Zhapa, which used to describe itself as a “leading provider for low-cost online internet credit card processing merchant accounts for both Low Risk and High Risk merchants”, hosted a number of gambling websites on it’s DNS server, including BetonUSA.com, formerly owned by Josh Bazoov and Craig Levett until they claimed to have sold their interests following the US government’s 2006 passage of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA), Oddmaker.ag and Referincome.com. The AMF has accused CEO David of funneling insider info regarding Amaya transactions to Josh, who then transmitted said info to Levett, who passed it on to others while engaging in suspected illegal trades that reaped over $1.5m in profits.

The possible connection of Amaya to a business that appeared to be actively processing payments for US-facing online gambling companies in defiance of the UIGEA could prove of particular interest to gaming regulators in New Jersey, where Amaya’s provisional license to operate Pokerstarsnj.com was recently renewed for another six-month period.

Source CalvinAyre