[Lance Thompson]

Today is Tuesday, July 3rd, 2018 and the World Series of Poker is being televised from 7:00pm – 11:00pm EST on ESPN from July 2nd through I believe July 13th or 14th.

I’m tuning-in AND recording it. Nothing like watching “the pros” in action. Taking place at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in beautiful Downtown Las Vegas.

 

Exciting stuff.

[Lance Thompson]

Yeah……it was a hard fought marathon between the final 2 players but congratulations to John Cynn on winning the 2018 World Series of Poker’s Main Event No Limit Title in the wee hours of the morning this morning, Sunday, July 15th, 2018. He better enjoy it cause with 7,900 entrants every year, these days the possibility of ever winning the event for a 2nd time is slimmer than slim. It’s not like back in 1980 when they only had 300 entrants. I only say that to any of you who aspire to save up the $10,000 and go out to Vegas for 2 weeks in early July one of these years to play and compete in the World Series. Don’t be even slightly deterred or defeated if you don’t make it to the final table, or don’t even finish “in the money”. Back in the 1970’s & 1980’s when guys like Doyle Brunson, Phil Helmuth & Johnny Chan were winning more than 1 WSOP Main Event bracelet they had fewer than 400 entrants. That was a much easier field to dominate than today where nearly 8,000 people enter the tournament. Here are some of the big named poker players that I spotted on tv the past 2 weeks who played in the 2018 WSOP who got bounced out and sent home with either an “in the money” winning, or in other cases got sent home with nothing but a “story”……and be advised that these aren’t any run-of-the-mill poker players…..ALL OF THESE PEOPLE play poker for a living…..this is their “profession”, it’s how they make a living….it’s how they pay the bills…..and every last one of them are multimillionaires:

#1. Daniel Negreanu

#2. Phil Ivey

#3. Joe Cada (did make the Final Table)

#4. Antonio Esfandiari

#5. Phil Hellmuth Jr.

#6. Johnnie Chan

#7. Michael Mizrachi

#8. Patrik Antonius

#9. Chris Moneymaker (that’s not his nickname, that’s his family’s real last name)

#10. Maria Ho

#11. Fedor Holz

#12. 2016 Main Event Champ Qui Nguyen

#13. 2017 Main Event Champ Scott Blumstein (got sent packing on Day 1 if I’m not mistaken)

 

From watching these guys on tv and from listening to what they’ve been saying, since poker has become such a worldwide craze and phenomenon, while they do enter the WSOP every year and while they DO take it seriously, most of them are now entering a lot of other poker tournaments in other parts of the world. Most of them are going over to Europe for the European Poker Tour tournaments (EPT), they’re entering tournaments in Australia, tournaments in Brazil and tournaments in China, Japan, Singapore and all over Asia. So yeah, they still enter the WSOP, but they’re playing in so many other tournaments that now the WSOP has turned into a small blip on their calendars.

That’s why I was saying before, check your local casino and I’ll guarantee you that they’re hosting at least ONE big tournament every month……at least one. Like at Maryland Live they do a $450 Buy-In/$100K Guaranteed tournament every month with a guaranteed 1st Prize of $20k minimum…..many times that 1st Prize swells up to $35k. That’s nothing to sneeze at.

Main thing to always remember before you get involved in playing poker or in any of these other suggested forms of investing is to ALWAYS be checking with the guys at H&R Block regarding “how much” of you tournament or cash-game winnings should be paid to the federal government for taxes. If you win tournaments, many times the casino is going to write you a check…..and when they do, they’re reporting that to the IRS. So if the casino is reporting it to the IRS, YOU HAVE TO TOO. Always report your earnings for money you make from playing poker, from cryptocurrency investing, from stock investing and from flipping houses, and ALWAYS pay your taxes good people.

 

Last thing you want is the IRS knocking on your door…..you don’t want “those kinds of problems”.

 

http://www.espn.com/poker/story/_/id/24102522/john-cynn-wins-2018-world-series-poker-main-event

[Lance Thompson]

What a coincidence…..this article that just came out yesterday perfectly dovetails this subject regarding the many multiple ways that people from other countries & people from other races are using “multiple streams of income” to raise money for investing in real estate. Real estate millionaire Dolf de Roos says in his book Real Estate Riches that “The rich either make their money in real estate or they hold their money in real estate” and as I was saying earlier in this thread, quite often when I’m at the poker table, Asians, whites, Middle Easterners and people from India are talking about the many multiple ways they are raising money to invest in real estate, including but not limited to playing poker, cryptocurrency investing, stock investing, flipping property as well as many other methods taught in the boardgames Cashflow 101 and Cashflow 202 that you can find on Robert Kiyosaki’s website http://www.richdad.com

 

Hope you enjoy this article……..

 

China’s Crypto Millionaires Are Using Bitcoin to Buy Real Estate Abroad

https://www.coindesk.com/china-bitcoin-crypto-millionaire-real-estate/

[Lance Thompson]

World Series of Poker Main Event Champion John Cynn the following day after he won the World Series doing an interview on CNBC…..and guess one of the things they asked the World Series of Poker Champion about??

Cryptocurrency investing!!………..As well as his other “investing” plans with the First Place Money he won in the poker tournament. Hmmmm……..what a coincidence.

Check out the interview………………………

 

 

[Lance Thompson]

Good people,

Below is a link for each state in the U.S. and exactly how many gaming properties they have in each state. Gaming properties would include casinos, horse tracks, dog tracks, etc. When I talked about playing poker that is “totally different” from other types of casino games like Blackjack, 21, Roulette, Craps, electronic slot machines and others. Whenever I enter a casino I remain “restricted” to poker & poker only where I’m playing only against “other people”, not the house. The old adage that “The house always wins” is true in the rest of those games, but doesn’t apply to poker. That’s always something to bear in mind. Checkout the link for the list of gaming properties in the state where you reside………..always play “responsibly”, and remember to always be in the habit of getting up and GOING HOME when the money runs out. If you get bounced off the table or get bounced out of a tournament and have to wait for 2 weeks, a month or 2 months before you have the money to come back? That’s the way it goes!! Losing simply is a part of playing poker. If you can’t handle “the swings”, meaning the downs as well as the ups then you would be better suited never playing the game.

 

Want you to think real long and hard about that.

 

http://us.casinocity.com/

[Lance Thompson]

Here he is…..The Man….The Myth….The Legend…..Phil Ivey aka No Home Jerome aka The Tiger Woods of Poker winning his 5th World Series of Poker bracelet at the tender young age of 28 over Robert Williamson in the 2005 Pot-Limit Omaha Championship……Phil’s payday was $635,000 for winning that event……………..

 

[Lance Thompson]

How To Play Poker Tournaments by PokerStars.net

 

[Lance Thompson]

Trailer for the movie The Big Short………………..

 

[Lance Thompson]

Trailer for the movie Margin Call…………………………

 

[Lance Thompson]

Trailer for the movie Rounders & although the chosen profession studied in the movie is poker, it’s really a movie that teaches you about risk-taking period………Oh by the way, wanna make sure that you all have a very “deep” understanding of 1 particular scene where you can miss it if you’re not careful. The scene near the end of the movie where Worm gets busted cheating by the state troopers and ends up getting both him & Mike’s a$$es whipped. What Worm was using was an illegal dealing method called “base-dealing” where the dishonest dealer is dealing off of the bottom of the deck. When the Sarge says “Okay, if you boys aren’t working let’s let the cards do the talking. Stu, turn over his cards” and when Stu flipped the cards over there were three 7s and an Ace right? Then the Sarge says “One more thing, let me see the deck…..” and when Stu handed him the deck, the Sarge shows everybody the bottom card which was a second Ace that Worm was just about to give to Mike. Well that would have given Mike two Aces and three 7s which would have been a Full House. Out of the Top 10 Ranking Poker Hands, Full House is the 4th highest ranking hand you can have. The only other 3 hands that beat a Full House are a 4 Of A Kind, A Straight Flush and a Royal Flush and it was next to impossible that anybody else at the table would have had any of those 3 hands……not completely impossible but NEARLY impossible. Worm basically handed Mike what they call in poker “The nuts” which in poker lingo means “nothing beats it”…..he was dealing him a hand that could have cleaned out several stacks at the table…..that’s why those cops were so angry and reacted the way that they did.

That’s why the #1 thing I took away from that movie is whatever you do, STAY AWAY from playing poker in underground spots. Only play in the casinos where there are floor managers & cameras in the ceilings watching “every move” of the dealers. I’m not saying that it’s “completely impossible” to cheat in casinos, but it’s extremely difficult……extremely difficult. The movie Casino with Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci and Sharon Stone shows you how intense the monitoring that takes place in these casinos really is, and that was back in the day BEFORE they began installing surveillance cameras in those establishments. So casinos are pretty trustworthy, at least U.S. casinos. Can’t necessarily vouch for the casinos in other countries but I’m betting that in most “advanced industrialized” countries that they have systems setup pretty similar to what they do here in the U.S.

 

[Lance Thompson]

An outstanding tutorial on “Playing in position” in poker. Enjoy. Be sure to understand 1 thing about playing tournament poker…..it’s not only about your level of knowledge when it comes to “how to play”, another huge piece of succeeding at tournament poker is “tenacity”…..just having an understanding that you WILL get bounced out of most tournaments and sent home with nothing but a story. The question is are you willing to fail multiple times until you make that Final Table?? Are you willing to fail multiple times until you win one?? Are you willing to fail your way to success and come back again & again & again & again & again & again & again??…..If you don’t win the tournament on May 20th are you willing to come back and give it another try on June 20th?? And on July 20th?? and on August 20th?? And on September 20th?? And on October 20th??…….Needless to say, tournament poker is different than cash games but if there’s anything that I’ve learned it’s that tournament poker is all about “failing your way to success”.

 

[Lance Thompson]

Yeah………here’s the text of an e-mail that was just sent out by Robert Kiyosaki, author of the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad on this morning, Thursday, September 20th, 2018. Enjoy.

The question I’m asked most is about crypto and people wondering if they should care about it.

There is so much DIS-information that it is hard for anyone to KNOW anything about this new asset. But that is what cryptocurrencies are… assets.

And assets put money IN your pockets. So… yeah. Better learn about crypto.

When I talk with Jeff Wang – the smartest crypto guy I know – he says Crypto is…

What the airplane was in the 1930’s
What Rock-n-roll was in the 1950’s
What the internet was in the 1980’s
What the smart phone was in the 2000’s

In other words, crypto is one the biggest, most innovative movements we may ever see in our lifetime. And that’s simply because…

Crypto is going to change MONEY!

So, what do you think? Should you take the time and energy to learn about something that is changing money? And in changing money, changes our whole life, society and culture?

Imagine what will happen if you don’t? You could lose everything you’ve been working for. Now imagine you do learn. You are lucky to be alive because you are at the birth of a new asset class. That’s like being alive at the Big Bang or creation… the birth of gold.

The problem is the media is not honest about it… or ignorant.

Crypto currencies are the secret weapon on front lines of the currency wars. It’s called a currency war because people will literally live or die based on the outcomes. And when it comes to cryptocurrency outcomes…

The potential profits are HUGE!

So, do I care about cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin?
You bet I do!

[Lance Thompson]

Oh by the way good people,

Anybody who “deeply understands” the movie The Big Short, please don’t hesitate to call me and explain exactly what a credit default swap is & how it works. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve watched that movie dozens of times and I get the general gist of it…..the official definition of a CDS according to Investopedia is as follows:

A credit default swap is a particular type of swap designed to transfer the credit exposure of fixed income products between 2 or more parties…..A credit default swap is the most common form of credit derivative and may involve municipal bonds, emerging market bonds, mortgage-backed securities or corporate bonds. A credit default swap is a financial swap agreement that the seller of the CDS will compensate the buyer in the event of a debt default (by the debtor) or other credit event.

 

Okay so the big banks created & sold these CDS’s to Dr. Mike Burry, Mike Baum’s group, Charlie Geller & Jamie Shipley in the movie expecting those investors who bought them from them to pay them premiums for the rest of the time they owned them right? I get that. They sold those CDS’s back in 2004 – 2006 thinking there was no way they could ever lose simply because the nation & the world had never ever experienced a real estate crash. But once we had mortgage delinquencies skyrocketing on us in 2007 & 2008, why were the investors who held those CDS’s willing to sell them back to the big banks? If the agreement was that the big banks would pay the buyers of those CDS’s in the event of mass mortgage defaults, why sell them?? Can’t you just collect premiums from the big banks for, I don’t know…..maybe not into perpetuity but maybe for a much longer period of time??

Somebody who understands, please educate me on them when you get a chance.

LT

[Lance Thompson]

For all interested, below is a link to a list of all cryptocurrencies available for purchase & trading by the general public, as well as their ticker-symbols. My 3 favorites are Tronix, Dogecoin & Ripple. Which ones do you like?

 

https://coinmarketcap.com/all/views/all/

 

Please be advised that there are 2 pages of messages in this thread. If you want to see what’s on the next page please click on “2” for Page 2.

[Lance Thompson]

For those looking for a more “formal” definition of exactly what a cryptocurrency is and what the blockchain is, checkout this 19 minute YouTube video. Cryptocurrency…….the future of money…………………………