Administration for troubled World Gaming

Leisure Report, Nov, 2006

Online gambling firm World Gaming has gone into administration, hours before the law that has barred it operating in the US was passed.

US business made up the "overwhelming majority" of revenues, the firm said.

Shares in the firm, which is listed on London's Alternative Investment Market (AIM) but operated mainly out of Antigua, were suspended last month.

The company said it had concluded it could no longer trade in the US, which contributes more than 90% of its revenues.

Administrators from UHY Hacker Young announced that four of World Gaming's top directors, including chief executive Daniel Moran, have resigned. Chief financial officer David Naismith, sales and marketing director Jonathan Moss and non-executive director Michael Cumming have also resigned.

World Gaming--which traded under sites including sportsbetting.com and betonusa.com--is the first betting firm to collapse as a result of the law.

In October, the group warned that it could be in "technical default of its loan conditions", after seeing its debt level soar to $23m (12.7m [pounds sterling]).

Last month, the firm's chairman, James Grossman, quit the business as fears grew that executives at internet gaming firms could be arrested in the US. A non-executive director at the group, Clare Roberts, also resigned.