Phil Ivey Returns to Full Tilt Poker as ‘Polarizing’: First Time Since ‘Black Friday’

Poker pro Phil Ivey, formerly one of the most prominent faces behind Full Tilt Poker, has begun playing at the site for the first time since the company was forced to exit the US market in April 2011.

The US Government charged two executives of Full Tilt Poker with money laundering and bank fraud on April 15, 2011.  The crackdown was commonly referred to as “Black Friday”.  Several bank accounts tied to the company were froze and Full Tilt Poker eventually shut its doors completely in the summer of 2011.  PokerStars acquired the assets of FTP this past summer and reopened the once popular online poker site.  Full Tilt Poker immediately became the second most trafficked Web card room. 

Ivey is playing under the handle of “Polarizing”. 

From HighStakesDB.com: 

Ivey will no doubt be keen to get stuck into the Full Tilt games and build on the over $19 milliion in winnings he has already ammassed there and he seems to have started well as he ended the day yesterday as the days second biggest winner, again from the 2-7 Triple Draw tables. Ivey took $145.6k from the $1k/$2k tables in some afternoon sessions. He has also started the day brightly today, with close to $80k taken this morning at the TD tables mainly from Scott "mastrblastr” Seiver.

Phil Ivey is set to open his own instructional poker site, IveyPoker.com, next month.

- Ace King, Gambling911.com