Poker Guru Blog

Greek players are trying to trick the system by maneuvering with tournament entries in order not to exceed the daily tax free limit in profits. The technique used by the players earned the witty name Taxes Hold’em.

PokerStars (and Full Tilt Poker) have launched their legal online poker room in Greece last week. Players of the .gr site are able to play against the .com pool but have to pay their taxes after their profits on a daily basis. The Player Withholding Tax (PWT) means that winnings of €100 or less are tax free, profits between €100 and €500 are subject to a 15% tax and players pay 20% after winnings of over €500. Of course, the room still deducts rake and losses are apparently (although not confirmedly) not deducted from the amounts won; they are likely to simply fall into the €100 or less category.

Caesars Entertainment has announced that the WSOP Europe and WSOP APAC festivals will rotate on an annual basis, which means the World Series comes to Europe next time as late as 2015.

With several additional festivals next to the WSOP, EPT and WPT stops, this year’s poker schedule has grown overly crowded, at the peak of a tendency apparent in past years. Meanwhile, the number of participants has stagnated at best, more often than not falling under previous years’ numbers. As a result, WSOP has decided to change the schedule of its non-US festivals.

While Senator Raymond Lesniak claims that his proposed bill can make the US State of New Jersey a hub for international online gaming, the sharing of player pool is not possible with the international market and the draft is therefore too optimistic in its goals.

New Jersey Senator Raymond Lesniak announced last week that his bill, then to be filed to the state legislation, would enable New Jersey to accept players from outside the USA. The proposal would establish Restricted Foreign Internet Wagering category licenses that would be given to operators in the state, allowing them to accept players from any foreign country where the local legislation allows or does not forbid online play. However, as it turns out, this would not enable sharing the liquidity between international and New Jersey players.

The iPoker network has previously released highlights of the changes they have been planning to implement to favour recreational players. More details have now surfaced, including cuts in table offering and supported currencies.

Playtech has previously announced some changes in the iPoker network that would further enhance the game experience for recreational users, in most cases at the expense of higher stakes regulars. More details surfaced today, so let us take a look at the plans of the network. According to the official announcement, games in USD will be discontinued; highest stakes tables removed; and the range of table variants reduced.

Daniel Negreanu is currently number one on the GPI, CardPlayer as well as the Bluff live tournament leaderboard. His main rival in the race for the Player of the Year title is Philipp Gruissem.

This year’s schedule is starting to run out of major live tournament and, as a result, the picture is becoming clearer and clearer as to who will compete for the Player of the Year on the major leaderboards. Daniel Negreanu has been dominating the lists since mid-September, when he was already topping the CardPlayer and Bluff leaderboards and was runner-up at GPI, second only to Ole Schemion.

PokerStars has launched its legal client in Greece. Players of the .gr site play with the .com player pool but have to pay their taxes after their poker income on a daily basis.

PokerStars has officially announced the launch of the PokerStars.gr site, in accordance with the Greek online gambling regulations. Residents of the country are only accepted here and cannot access the .com client. Nevertheless, they play against the international pool, except they have to pay their taxes on a daily basis: the Player Withholding Tax (PWT).

With the €1,000,000 Guaranteed Concord Card Million event, the Vienna Poker Festival kicks off on 27 November 2013. The Vienna Deluxe Challenge starts on 6 December.

The Vienna Poker Festival is the best excuse you can get to visit the beautiful city of Vienna in the heart of Europe. The main event of the festival is the Concord Card Million III, kicking off on 27 November with a €500 + €50 buy-in and a whopping €1,000,000 prize pool. On 6 December, another highlight event launches: the €220 Vienna Deluxe Challenge with €75,000 in guaranteed prize money.

New Jersey Senator Raymond Lesniak is expected to file a bill to accept non-US players from across the borders of the State.

On Thursday in a press conference, New Jersey Senator Raymond Lesniak is expected by several leading news sources to announce a bill that would allow the state level regulated gambling market to accept customers from across the state borders. If the proposal passes, players from outside the US would be able to play in the New Jersey online rooms.

With a seventh title in this year alone, Chris ‘moorman1’ Moorman broke his own 2009 record of Triple Crowns won in a single year.

Online multi-table tournament world list leader Chris ‘moorman1’ Moorman booked the 19th Triple Crown in his career on 17 November. The British ace by far tops the list of the most frequent winners with his latest achievement, leading ahead of ‘Belabacsi’ and his 11 titles.

Moorman won the first of the three required victories on 11 November in the Bwin $10,000 GTD Speed event for $2,860. On 16 November, he took down the EuroPoker $93 NLHE tournament for $4,278 and, a day later, the Winamax HIGHROLLER for $18,353. Booking his seventh title this year, Moorman broke his own record, which he set up back in 2009.

In Spain, Las Vegas Sands Corporation Head Sheldon Adelson demands that punters be allowed to smoke in casinos. In the United States, he establishes a coalition to prevent the legalization of online gambling.

Las Vegas Sands Corporation Head Sheldon Adelson has announced that he kicks off the Coalition to Stop Internet Gambling (CSIG) next January with the aim of preventing the federal and state level regulation of online gambling in the USA.

"In my 15 years of working with him, I don't think I have ever seen him this passionate about any issue," Adelson’s political advisor Andy Abboud said, adding that about two dozens of employees are already working on setting his plans into motion.

On Sunday, Philipp Gruissem took down his second WPT Alpha8 event after his victory in London. The German pro won $1,086,400.

WPT has launched this year a brand new high roller series, the Alpha8. The first stop was held in Florida, starting on 26 August and the title going to Steven ‘Zugwat’ Silverman, along with the $891,660 first prize. Two more stops have since taken place and both were won by Philipp Gruissem. In London, 20 players entered and Gruissem faced Scott Seiver heads-up, defeating him in a huge battle for $1,379,840.

Pennsylvania follows in the footsteps of Nevada, New Jersey and Delaware in kicking off the process of legalising online poker.

This April, Ultimate Poker, the first ever legal online poker room of the United States launched in Nevada. WSOP.com has since followed suit and is currently hosting even more players than its rival. The State of Delaware joined later and New Jersey is opening its market soon. On 21 November, a five-day test period starts with select players granted the opportunity to play in the rooms, for testing and bug fixing purposes. If the operators – Borgata.com, PartyPokerNJ.com, Let’sPlayNJ.com (Betfair), UCasino.com (Ultimate Poker), Tropicana.net and GoldenNuggetPoker.net – manage to perform well, real money poker is going live in the state.

From 14 to 24 November 2013, the 6th season of the MicroMillions series is running at PokerStars, for a total prize pool of $5,000,000 guaranteed.

The all popular micro limit championship of PokerStars, MicroMillions launches again. The sixth instalment features 100 events between 14 and 24 November. On the final day (25 November in the CET time zone), the $22 Main Event takes place and it boasts a $1,000,000 guaranteed prize pool. The winner can rest assured to take home at least $150,000.

The bumhunting problem, even more present at heads-up tables than at ring games, might be addressed at long last at PokerStars as well, by launching Heads-Up Zoom tables.

A recent trend, extremely harmful for poker, is bumhunting: regulars of a given stake, usually mid or higher, sit at tables but refuse to play against each other and prefer to wait for recreational players. In a way, they hunt weaker opponents, hurting the economy of the game, its integrity as well as the rooms’ interests, as players so discouraged are prone to leave the game for good. Bumhunting has been recently going more and more out of control and several rooms have already taken steps to prevent players from abusing the system this way.

What is the current state of the mobile gambling market and what are the forecasts? Its growth is not only undeniable but also the most intense of all, reaching an almost 20% market share in just two years. What is to come next? Watch the incredible statistics in graphic form below.

Strongly connected to online poker are online betting and casino games, as most major sites offer more or all of these forms of entertainment and, undeniably, ways of income. It is also no shocking news that the most dynamically evolving area of this market is that of mobile gambling. In fact, its growth is so frantic that it is already making up almost 20% of the total online gambling market and is expected to be worth $100 billion by 2017.