Delaware iPoker Revenues Plunge 73% To $28,589 In December

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Thursday, January 22nd, 2015 | Written by Stephen Smith

Whilst November saw Delaware reverse four months of declines with a 42% improvement in online gambling revenues to $184,898 compared to the previous month, December’s results have returned to negative territory once more with revenues down by 8.2% to $169,606. Furthermore, online poker accounted for just $28,589 of that tally, representing a 9.6% decline from the $31,610 generated in November, as well as the state’s third lowest total since its first site launched 14 months ago.

iPoker Down 73% In December

The latest results released by the Delaware State Lottery shows the state collected $28,589 in iPoker rake and fees, with Delaware Park continuing to dominate the market with $15,964 in revenues, followed by Dover Downs with $7,625, and Harrington Raceway with $4,999. According to those figures, not only has online poker fallen by 9.6% compared to November, but revenues are also lower by a massive 73% compared to the $106,922 the state generated in December 2013.

That was the very first full month Delaware had offered online poker, and since then enthusiasm for the game has obviously waned as a lack of liquidity in a state of less than 1 million people has meant not enough action being seen at its virtual tables, in turn offering no incentive for players to visit and play on the sites.

MSIGA Greatly Needed

Unlike casino games in which players compete against the house, poker requires sufficient liquidity to support a healthy, attractive environment complete with plenty of cash game action and attractive tournament prize pools. Highlighting this point, a pokerupdate report even suggested a state needs at least 40 million people to ensure a viable internet poker market, therefore placing states such as Delaware (925k) and Nevada (2.8m) at an instant disadvantage. The necessity of organizing a Multi State Internet Gaming Agreement (MSIGA) with other regulated states thus becomes a matter of priority, and as Dover Downs Casino CEO Ed Sutor commented after a MSIGA was announced with Nevada in February 2014:

“What that means, quite simply, is we’ll have a lot more players who can come into the poker room.. There will be more games available at different denominations. And that should help both states.. It would be very helpful if New Jersey got into our compact, not only for us, but for them. They need more players, as well.”

Incredibly, almost one year later with both Nevada and Delaware continuing to reel from plummeting iPoker revenues, the MSIGA appears no closer to becoming a reality.

AAPN At Forefront Of Future Liquidity Compact

While 888 powers all Delaware’s three licensed online gambling sites, and also currently powers Nevada’s only viable online poker site WSOP.com, the plan after the interstate compact is enacted between between Delaware and Nevada is to host all the two states’ poker sites on an 888 powered network known as the All American Poker Network (AAPN). As an 888 statement explained at the time:

“We are aiming to deploy a shared poker network across the two states, which will offer poker players in each state an enhanced customer experience. We remain fully committed to the U.S. market through our B2B business as well as through our interest in the AAPN joint venture.”

While Delaware and Nevada’s MSIGA is waiting to get off the ground, last week the WSOP.com and 888Poker’s All American Poker Network (AAPN) took preliminary steps towards closer integration by partially combining their player pools in New Jersey, thus paving the way for a similar process to take place in Nevada/Delaware. Already the results have been spectacular, too, with both WSOP.com and 888poker now overtaking Party Borgata as NJ’s most popular sites.

Online Gambling Drops 8.2% In December

Finally, online poker was not the only game to report a decline in December, and online gambling as a whole – which includes video lottery, casino games, as well as poker – generated a total of $169,606 last month, down 8.2% from the $184,898 taken in November. Furthermore, the number of new account signups were also down in December, with new registrations totaling 256, 17% lower than the 308 players who created new accounts in November.

Here are the First State’s iGambling results for the whole of 2014:

Jan – $145,667 (+3.7%)
Feb – $167,333 (+14.8%)
Mar – $207,038 (+23.7%)
Apr – $240,762 (-12.2%)
May – $175,410 (-27.4%)
Jun – $187,332 (+6.8%)
Jul – $172,496 (-7.9%)
Aug – $172,853 (-0.2%)
Sep – $145,022 (-16%)
Oct – $130,468 (-10%)
Nov – $184,898 (+42%)
Dec – $169,606 (-8.2%)