<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Sounds to me like someone (or maybe more than one) pushed the panic button to soon. 4 months in business is not near enough time to judge wether or not a book will succeed. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
I think that you have a number of "investors" in off-shore books who have a very unrealistic idea of what it's like to be in business. They get sold on off-shore bookmaking as a cash grab.
Everything goes fine for a few months as new money is streaming in. The people running these books can't even spell the phrase "fiduciary responsibility" as in segregating and protecting customer funds. So, for awhile everyone is dipping into the till. Payroll, expenses etc., items that should be paid out of investor capital, are paid with post up money.
Soon, the new post up isn't enough to pay expenses, profit rips, and lastly (lest I forget), winners. So, the book managers have a "conference" with investors. Of course they have to explain why the profit checks aren't coming anymore. The big decision is do we throw good money after bad? Do we put more capital in place to pay off customers or do we walk away? After all, at this point, most of the losses (maybe all of them) have been borne by the customers. We're really not out much yet. Well, while we decide, freeze the remaining customer monies just in case.
So, in the end, the investors get most if not all of their money back. The tout services have been paid all along and move on to tout another start-up. The book employees move on to another book. A few customers get disgusted and quit betting, but they are replaced by new ones. After all, it's a growth industry.
