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Jeff Burbank SPECIAL TO THE RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL:
LAS VEGAS — Last week, he talked about sports betting on CNBC. His weekly football show on the cable channel Spike TV just wrapped up for the season.
He’s lined up a publisher for his second book, and has a reality TV program in the works.
But Wayne Allyn Root really is trying to get investors interested in his 3-year-old online sports information firm, GWIN Inc., for which he serves as chief executive and handicapper, not to mention relentless pitchman.
Root is cheering for Atlantic City, N.J., to approve a plan to bring sports wagering to the Boardwalk. And, now that Great Britain’s Isle of Man has permitted online casinos to accept overseas wagers from Americans, Root said the U.S. government should take another look at legalizing Internet casinos as a new source of tax revenue.
“It’s crazy it’s illegal here,” said Root, a 43-year-old former sportscaster for the defunct Financial News Network in Los Angeles. “It’s legal with our allies, England, Canada and Australia. Seventy percent of the bettors are U.S. citizens.
“I have nothing to do with the betting (on sports), but it would certainly help my business if it were legal, regulated and taxed. The American government can’t stop it. Why would America miss out on all those taxes? I’d say that in five to 10 years, it will be legalized.”
As GWIN’s lead handicapper, Root makes money by charging bettors fees to read his predictions about the results of college and pro football, college basketball and pro baseball games, based on odds set by others.
“An odds maker sets the lines,” he said. “I’m an analyst of games with the odds already set. I’m sort of like a stockbroker, like what Merrill Lynch does on Wall Street. My job is to beat the point spread.”
From his frequent media interviews (a partial list includes Fortune magazine, NBC’s “The Today Show,” CNN’s “On the Record” and “Crossfire,” Fox’s “The O’Reilly Factor,” and ESPN’s “Sportscenter”) has garnered Root such nicknames as “The Face of Las Vegas Gambling” and “The King of TV Infomercials.”
But that’s a hard act for his Las Vegas company to follow. GWIN has yet to catch up to Root’s incredible success in drawing publicity, although it has had its share of bad luck as well.
In late 2003, a hacker was able to gain entry into GWIN’s database of customers, which was then sold to the company’s competitors. Root estimated that the theft cost GWIN about $2 million in lost revenues last year, but the company has since recovered, with sales of more than $1 million in November alone.
But while GWIN brings in about $7 million to $8 million in revenues a year, it reported a quarterly loss of $777,000 in October, almost double the loss a year earlier. Its stock on the over-the-counter market fell by nearly 30 percent on Friday, to only 7 cents a share.
Still, Root’s flush with new ideas to attract attention. He plans to open an office in London and hire Britons to handicap cricket, soccer and rugby. His follow up to his recent book, “The Zen of Gambling,” is going to be “Millionaire Republican: The Secrets of Success,” to be published by Penguin Putnam.
He also is looking for someone to produce a reality show, “The King of Vegas,” where bettors vying to be the biggest winner in a Nevada casino.
As for the more distant future, Root, originally from Mount Vernon, N.Y., said he’d like to run for the U.S. Senate as a Republican by 2015, he said. But first he wants to make a winner out of GWIN.
“Sports gambling was always my interest,” he said. “I wouldn’t even watch sports if I wasn’t betting on it. I’d rather go out with my wife and three kids and go to a movie or something.”
(End)
Scam artist!
Jeff Burbank SPECIAL TO THE RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL:
LAS VEGAS — Last week, he talked about sports betting on CNBC. His weekly football show on the cable channel Spike TV just wrapped up for the season.
He’s lined up a publisher for his second book, and has a reality TV program in the works.
But Wayne Allyn Root really is trying to get investors interested in his 3-year-old online sports information firm, GWIN Inc., for which he serves as chief executive and handicapper, not to mention relentless pitchman.
Root is cheering for Atlantic City, N.J., to approve a plan to bring sports wagering to the Boardwalk. And, now that Great Britain’s Isle of Man has permitted online casinos to accept overseas wagers from Americans, Root said the U.S. government should take another look at legalizing Internet casinos as a new source of tax revenue.
“It’s crazy it’s illegal here,” said Root, a 43-year-old former sportscaster for the defunct Financial News Network in Los Angeles. “It’s legal with our allies, England, Canada and Australia. Seventy percent of the bettors are U.S. citizens.
“I have nothing to do with the betting (on sports), but it would certainly help my business if it were legal, regulated and taxed. The American government can’t stop it. Why would America miss out on all those taxes? I’d say that in five to 10 years, it will be legalized.”
As GWIN’s lead handicapper, Root makes money by charging bettors fees to read his predictions about the results of college and pro football, college basketball and pro baseball games, based on odds set by others.
“An odds maker sets the lines,” he said. “I’m an analyst of games with the odds already set. I’m sort of like a stockbroker, like what Merrill Lynch does on Wall Street. My job is to beat the point spread.”
From his frequent media interviews (a partial list includes Fortune magazine, NBC’s “The Today Show,” CNN’s “On the Record” and “Crossfire,” Fox’s “The O’Reilly Factor,” and ESPN’s “Sportscenter”) has garnered Root such nicknames as “The Face of Las Vegas Gambling” and “The King of TV Infomercials.”
But that’s a hard act for his Las Vegas company to follow. GWIN has yet to catch up to Root’s incredible success in drawing publicity, although it has had its share of bad luck as well.
In late 2003, a hacker was able to gain entry into GWIN’s database of customers, which was then sold to the company’s competitors. Root estimated that the theft cost GWIN about $2 million in lost revenues last year, but the company has since recovered, with sales of more than $1 million in November alone.
But while GWIN brings in about $7 million to $8 million in revenues a year, it reported a quarterly loss of $777,000 in October, almost double the loss a year earlier. Its stock on the over-the-counter market fell by nearly 30 percent on Friday, to only 7 cents a share.
Still, Root’s flush with new ideas to attract attention. He plans to open an office in London and hire Britons to handicap cricket, soccer and rugby. His follow up to his recent book, “The Zen of Gambling,” is going to be “Millionaire Republican: The Secrets of Success,” to be published by Penguin Putnam.
He also is looking for someone to produce a reality show, “The King of Vegas,” where bettors vying to be the biggest winner in a Nevada casino.
As for the more distant future, Root, originally from Mount Vernon, N.Y., said he’d like to run for the U.S. Senate as a Republican by 2015, he said. But first he wants to make a winner out of GWIN.
“Sports gambling was always my interest,” he said. “I wouldn’t even watch sports if I wasn’t betting on it. I’d rather go out with my wife and three kids and go to a movie or something.”
(End)
Scam artist!
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