WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government is giving U.S. financial institutions another six months to comply with regulations designed to ban Internet gambling.
The rules would prohibit financial institutions from accepting payments from credit cards, checks or electronic fund transfers to settle online wagers.
The rules were supposed to take effect next week.
Instead, the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve say they'll be delayed until June of next year.
And that's welcome news to Congressman Barney Frank, a key Democratic opponent of the ban on online gambling.
He says the delay will give Congress a chance to overturn a law passed in 2006,
when Republicans controlled Congress.
Frank wants to let the Treasury Department license and regulate online gambling companies that service American customers.
He argues that it should be legal as a matter of personal liberty, and that the federal government could collect increased tax revenues if Internet gambling is regulated.
The financial industry had sought a delay.
It said the rules would be hard to enforce because there was no clear definition of
what constitutes Internet gambling.
(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
