Processing illegal online gambling transactions between 2004 and 2006 will cost Optimal Group Inc. $19.2 million, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced last Friday.
Optimal Group, a Montreal firm that operates Optimal Payments Corp., will forfeit the funds and has signed a nonprosecution agreement, the U.S. attorney's office said.
Between 2004 and 2006, Optimal Group operated FirePay Ltd., an online electronic wallet service that processed more than $2 billion of "illegal gambling transactions for United States customers," the U.S. attorney said in a press release.
Optimal Group said it stopped processing such transactions Oct. 13, 2006, the day the Unlawful Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 went into effect. Optimal Group, which began cooperating with U.S. investigators over two years ago, said it received a copy of seizure warrants for accounts held by two of its subsidiaries.
Optimal Group now primarily sells consumer electronics and toys. In February, Optimal Group said United Bank Card Inc., a Hampton, N.J., independent sales organization had agreed to purchase 5,000 of its merchant accounts for $11 million. In 2008, Optimal Group sold its card-not-present transaction-processing business to Card One Plus Ltd., a Toronto prepaid card and payments-services company, for $7 million.
