Casino.org – For centuries, Italy has been known for its beauty and culture. Travelers from throughout Europe and around the world would come to the nation to vacation on the beaches of Tuscany, to enjoy fine Italian food, and to experience cultural landmarks that date back to the Roman Empire. Of course, you can still do all of that today – in between the gambling you’ll be partaking in. Okay, so gambling might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Italy these days, but it’s an industry that has taken off in recent years…

iGaming Business – The BetCoin Bitcoin Entertainment Network has announced the launch of BetCoin Reels, a new animated slot machine that allows players to gamble with the Bitcoin virtual currency. BetCoin said the new HTML5 online slot machine web app features a design that can be accessed from any mobile platform and gives players the chance to win up to 1000 times their original bet. BetCoin Reels will also become the first BetCoin game to accept Litecoin credits, an alt-coin currency. James Mason, BetCoin’s chief operating officer’s assistant, added that the firm is currently updating its entire gaming platform with…

The Street – What a year! Going into 2013, no one expected the broader market averages to hit all-time highs. With stagnant wage growth, higher taxes and a still-fragile real estate market, how could have anyone have called the 30% returns we received last year? And yet here we are. With such astonishingly high returns, some investors may be looking to diversify their portfolios for the new year. Occasionally investor portfolios can become unevenly weighted when one position moves drastically to the upside. In this article I want to highlight three exchange traded funds to consider in the first quarter….

Fox News – Turning 103 is a rare milestone that one would think you’d want to celebrate in the company of  family and friends, not gambling and getting a tattoo. But that’s exactly what Seattle grandmother Hilda Evelyn Kottman did for her recent birthday. The adorable granny and her grandson marked her birthday by going to a casino, having an all-you-can-eat crab dinner and getting some ink. The Daily Dot reports this in not the only out-of-character acts for the grandmother. According to the website, Kottman, who lived through both World Wars, the moon landing and Sept. 11, reportedly stole…

New York Times – Renowned for its universities and a celebrated Renaissance monastery, this Lombardy town about 25 miles south of Milan has in recent years earned another, more dubious, distinction: the gambling capital of Italy. Slot machines and video lottery terminals, known as V.L.T.s, can be found all over in coffee bars and tobacco shops, gas stations, mom-and-pop shops and shopping malls, not to mention 13 dedicated gambling halls. By some counts, there is one slot machine or V.L.T. for every 104 of the city’s 68,300 residents. Critics blame the concentration of the machines for an increase in chronic…

iGaming Business – Information and advisory services provider the NPD Group has recorded a 25.4% rise in the sale of computing devices in the US in the 12 months up to November 2013. Using its Distributor Track and Commercial Reseller Tracking Service, the company reported that a total of 14.4 million desktops, notebooks and tablets had been sold through US commercial channels in the period. The increase of 25.4% far eclipses the 3.1% rise recorded in the previous year. Tablets experienced the most significant growth during the last year with sales having increased 49%, while sales for notebooks and desktop…