Ty Stewart says WSOP has stopped doing business with GPI
The times are getting tough for Alex Dreyfus, CEO of the Global Poker Index.
Last year it was revealed that Dreyfus scammed Fedor Holz and others for 5 figures at the WSOP.
While Dreyfus quickly "made it right" when the issue was brought public, I wondered if this would strain his relationship with the WSOP.
However, it appears that the GPI was paying the WSOP to use their system for the 2015/2016 Player of the Year, and now things have gone south, I'm assuming due to nonpayment.
On the last 2+2 Pokercast, starting at the 1:04:57 mark, WSOP director Ty Stewart discusses the GPI, and says that they have parted ways. He also reveals that he believes "there's a lot of people no longer doing business with that organization (GPI)".
Wow.
He also said that he was "not a big fan of the GPI system", which isn't something you say about a company with whom you concluded a successful business relationship. So there's definitely some bitterness.
So it sounds like GPI either ran out of money or breached their contract (or both), and the WSOP dropped them as a result. I'm guessing there's an unpaid bill.
It was recently announced that the WSOP would be using their own system for Player of the Year in 2017, and Seth Palansky revealed that the system was mostly developed by Jess Welman -- a critic of the GPI system in prior years.
I'm guessing that they had to scramble for a new system after severing ties with GPI, someone suggested Jess Welman, and they paid her some token sum of money to come up with something.
