Wpt Enterprises Inc

The Securities and Exchange Commission is seeking to force testimony from the man who it says ran the website of Doyle Brunson, a member of the Poker Hall of Fame now under investigation by the agency. The SEC has twice subpoenaed Wallace Nakano over www.doylesroom.com, where Brunson announced his unsolicited $700-million offer to buy Los Angeles-based WPT Enterprises Inc., creator of the World Poker Tour television show. Nakano claims that the subpoenas weren't properly served.

Jonathan Waessil is short-stacked. In poker, that means everybody else at the table has more chips than you do, but you're still alive. In life, it means we're sitting on his sofa in a modest little apartment in a modest little complex near a freeway construction zone in Garden Grove. Not a bad life, by any means, but the 65-year-old Waessil is about to make the biggest move of his poker-playing career.

Seven of the world's best poker players have pulled their chips together to fight the World Poker Tour. And they're not bluffing.

Is this a deal or a bluff? An investor group headed by two-time World Series of Poker champion Doyle "Texas Dolly" Brunson has made an unsolicited $700-million bid for WPT Enterprises Inc., owner of the "World Poker Tour" television show and online casino, WPT said Friday. The offer for WPT "does not specify any terms" beyond the price, said W. Todd Steele, chief financial officer of the Los Angeles company. "We assume there are other investors but they are not named."

Gaming entertainment company WPT Enterprises Inc. said Monday that it was willing to let a $700-million takeover offer expire today if it was still unable to get key information from the bidding group led by U.S. poker champion Doyle Brunson. "At this point, without any further information, we would let it expire," WPT Chief Executive Steven Lipscomb said.

Gaming entertainment company WPT Enterprises Inc.'s shares slid after a $700-million bid from U.S. poker champion Doyle Brunson crumpled, prompting some queries about the offer's veracity. A spokeswoman said WPT, which owns the "World Poker Tour" television series, spoke to Brunson, who indicated he would provide no further information about the vague cash offer that was received Thursday.

U.S. poker champion Doyle Brunson confirmed Wednesday that his $700-million offer to buy gaming entertainment group WPT Enterprises Inc. had expired, pushing the stock down an additional 8%. Los Angeles-based WPT, which owns the popular World Poker Tour television show, said a group of investors led by Brunson submitted the offer last Thursday and asked for a response by Tuesday, with a one-week extension provision.

American players drive the $2.4-billion online poker market, but the profits they generate flow overseas to the foreign companies that dominate the business. Now, Los Angeles-based WPT Enterprises Inc., whose televised World Poker Tour helped touch off the poker craze, wants a piece of that pot -- and to get it the company has ventured into uncharted legal territory.

U.S. securities regulators said Friday that they were formally investigating U.S. poker champion Doyle Brunson's unsolicited $700-million offer in July to buy WPT Enterprises Inc., a Los Angeles-based gaming entertainment firm. News of the bid, which was nearly double the company's market value at the time, sent WPT's stock soaring more than 50% in one day to an intraday high of $29.50.

The worldwide poker industry appears to have hit every possible inside straight, flush and full house that it could, accumulating a large pot of cash in the process. But as this holiday season nears an end, the industry's luck seems to be running out as boxed sets of cards and chips are discounted, ratings fade for some poker-themed television shows and shares of a poker-linked stock slump.