WSOP Bracelet Winner Resigns From Kabul Bank

2008 WSOP Europe bracelet winner Sherkhan Farnood stands accused of serious misdealings at Afghanistan’s biggest bank.

The Central Bank of Afghanistan moved to replace the management of the troubled Kabul Bank this week – and WSOP gold bracelet-winning poker player Sherkhan Farnood is at the center of some seriously scandalous goings-on.

Kabul Bank handles payments for soldiers, police and teachers in the troubled Central Asian nation. But its politically connected management, including Farnood, is accused of making up to $300 million worth of bad real estate deals in Dubai and disposing of hundreds of millions of dollars more in off-the-books loans, threatening the stability of the entire country at a crucial time. Farnood and several other key management figures stepped down after President Hamid Karzai threatened them with arrest earlier this week.

The move by Karzai is not entirely surprising; earlier this year, in an interview about the way his bank does business, Farnood was quoted saying, “What I’m doing is not proper, not exactly what I should do. But this is Afghanistan.” Since resigning Farnood has pledged to hand over the titles to $160 million in Dubai property, all of it bought with Kabul Bank money but registered under his and his wife’s names.

Farnood has a total of eight tournament victories from festivals in Austria, Australia, France and England on his poker resume. By far the biggest of them came in 2008 when he triumphed in the £2,500 Limit HORSE event at WSOP Europe, making him only the second Afghan poker player (behind 2002 $5,000 Seven Card Stud winner Qushqar Morad) to win a WSOP bracelet. Among the competitors he bested at that final table were Howard Lederer, Jeffrey Lisandro and Phil Ivey. The win had a measure of redemption in it, as Farnood had narrowly missed winning a bracelet in 2006, finishing second in that year’s $1,500 Pot Limit Omaha with Rebuys event.