Two weeks ago Everleaf Gaming abruptly left the U.S. and French market after the network had approximately $27,000 in funds seized and subsequently was given a cease and desist order by the U.S. government. Since then, U.S. players have received no additional word on the status of their funds until today's statement (which can be seen below). For non-US players, Everleaf states that its "business as usual." Cashouts for non-US players are being paid, but players are reporting that cashouts are taking a few weeks in many cases. According to PokerScout the network traffic is only down 16% since the site banned U.S. and French players, a testament to their strong European player base. The full Everleaf statement: As has been reported, certain funds maintained by one of our payment processors to be distributed to U.S. customers were seized by U.S. authorities. To our knowledge, the U.S. authorities seized these funds and blocked the transactions based on purported violations of certain U.S. laws, including operating an illegal money transmitting business, the Wire Act, and money laundering. Evidence relative to the subject can be reviewed from the attached papers. Please be advised that this seizure occurred in the United States and only affects U.S. players. In view of the above Everleaf will no longer accept U.S. players. None the less Everleaf reiterates and wants to reassure all the effected players that all the funds will be refunded in full and the effected parties will be contacted in a short while accordingly. For the other markets we operate in and with regards to all our other players we want to reassure you that nothing has changed and thank you for the continued business with our Company. We sincerely apologize for the lack of communication to date, but as a Company we were still trying to find our feet and assessing the situation at hand and how to best protect the interest of all the effected parties. Everleaf Gaming
As some of you may know, each month I go through each of our partner rooms and post the most significant non-exclusive promotions of the month. Today, I thought I would share my subjective analysis of the most interesting promotions on the list -- my Top 7 -- running during February. 1) WPT/Party Poker Card Rush During February, Party Poker and WPT Poker bring back the popular Card Rush. For each 15 Party Points a player earns they will receive a game piece that will reveal a guaranteed prize of a minimum of 10 Party Points up to a grand prize of $5,000. Card Rush Race points will also be earned towards a leaderboard that will pay additional cash prizes of $50 to $9,000 to the top 200 players. Party Poker will also scatter $50 spots to players finishing 220 through 2,000. Party Poker will be awarding up to 1.8 million cards during the length of this promotion. Undoubtedly, many of these cards will be Party Points and freeroll entries but it's still a great extra perks that grinders should appreciate. 2) Carbon Poker/Aced/Black Chip Poker $25,000 Bankroll Booster Freerolls Carbon Poker, Aced and Black Chip Poker will be running numerous daily qualifiers to the $25,000 Bankroll Booster Freeroll to be held on February 26th at 2 PM ET. There is no direct way to get into the tournament so players must enter either three-times-daily Freeroll Qualifiers (at 13:30, 17:30 or 21:30) or via VIP Points Earned Qualifiers. The VIP Points Qualifiers are run nine times daily. To qualify for these tournaments, players must earn a designated number of VIP Points the previous day and/or the current day up to the time of the tournament. I'm estimating an overlay of about $10 per player in the final. 3) Minted Poker $1 Max Rake Minted Poker and other sites on the Everleaf Network have extended $1 Max rake caps on all tables through February. These tables should be attracting more players than they are due to the fact they are not subject to the large 5 euro max rake and the winning limits that players must undergo at the euro tables. This would be the top promotion in online poker if there was more traffic on these tables. 4) Betsafe $100,000 Points Races Betsafe offers their lucrative Points Race every month so this promotion isn't any more special than previous months. I like this promotion not only for the total size of the prize pool -- which is divided into two promo periods each month -- but the overall value to players. Betsafe also sweetens the pot by providing a $6,000 freeroll to all players that finish in the top 100 of Race 1 or 2. 5) True Poker/Americas Cardroom You really wouldn't think that a small network such as Winning Poker would be able to offer such large promotions, but during February they have actually increased their monthly race promotions to $100,000. $60,000 of the prize pool is awarded to the top FPP Point earners during the month and another $40,000 will be given away during weekend "Sprints," $10k each weekend. Note that the Sprints are only available to ring game players while the $60k "Marathon" is offered to both ring game and tournament players and actually awards bonus points for participation in top tournaments. 6) Boss Magic Hands For one day only on February 14th, the Boss Network (Poker Heaven, Fortune Poker, Interpoker) are awarding cash prizes to players that hit various Valentine's Day themed hands. I've always loved these types of promotions, especially ones that are relatively easy to hit like this one. Players receive €25 for a Heart Flush, €25 when losing 3 hands with K and Q of hearts and €250 when winning a hand with Straight Flush of Hearts. Players must submit a Magic Hand to claim via the Player Zone within 72 hours of hitting the hand. Note that both hole cards must be used and other rules apply. 7) Mansion Poker On Target! I'm also a big fan of promotions that guarantee a prize when a certain amount of play is achieved and that is exactly what Mansion is offering during February with their "On Target" promotion. Each week during the month, players can enter On Target via a no-play tournament from the lobby. Players that hit a raked hand target during the week will receive a cash reward and a $50 pending bonus. Prizes start at $5 and a $50 bonus for reaching 200 raked hands. Not bad, especially for grinders and when combining the promotion on top of the other many Mansion promotions. There you have it- my personal favorite standard online poker promotions for the month of February. If you a PAS publisher, be sure to also check out over $300,000 in exclusive promotions during the month of February. Good luck and happy marketing!
At the beginning of each month, we post the top standard promotions for the month in the Poker Marketing Forum. Often times as the month moves along new promotions are announced by poker rooms. The promotions below are some of the best that you should be informing your players about for the rest of January. Party Poker Rake Free Tournaments: For the remainder of January, Party Poker is slashing buy-in fees on all multi-table tournaments. To celebrate this offer, Party Poker is offering a 100% up to $100 reload bonus and a $50,000 Depositor Freeroll entry to all players that use bonus code RAKEFREE. Minted Poker $1 Rake Caps Minted Poker has continued $1 Rake Caps on all USD tables through the month of January. Euro tables are not eligible for this promotion. Minted Poker will also be holding a large €10,000 guaranteed tournament on January 29th. Red Kings $85,000 Points Race Ongame's Red Kings is offers a huge $85,000 Points Race each month, and players only need to play for three days in a row to qualify for a prize. A player simply needs to finish in the top 120 chart for three consecutive days to receive a prize based on their performance during those days. The next three-day cycle starts with the accumulation of more Player Points. Betsafe Second $60,000 Race It's not too late for players to start accumulating Race Points towards Betsafe's second $60,000 January Race, which started January 17th. The leaderboard will pay cash prizes of up to $7,500 to the top 100 Race Point earners. In addition to the cash prizes, the Top 15 finishers from Race 1 and 2 will receive an entry into a $6,000 January Race freeroll in early February. Red Star $27,000 Rake Race The $27,000 Rake Race (really more like a Rake Chase) is one of the best offered by a Cake Poker Network site. Players that generate rake at 1 of 14 levels are paid predetermined cash prizes of $3 to $2,000. Many of the smaller cash prizes have been claimed, but there are plenty of opportunities remaining for players that generate at least $350 in rake for the rest of the month. These cash rewards effectively pay more than 10% extra rakeback to players. Intertops FPP Race Intertops, a popular Cake Network poker room, offers $6,250 FPP Races each week exclusively to their players. The weekly leaderboards pay the top 100 FPP earners during each promo period. Race 4 gets underway on January 22nd at 04:00 GMT and runs through January 29th at 04:00 GMT. Poker Heaven €20,000 Cash Race This race started on January 16th, but players have until January 29th to accumulate points towards this large race. The leaderboard will pay cash prizes to the tpo 50 point earners during the promotion period. This promotion is offered network wide but Poker Heaven seems to be offering the largest prizes. Players must opt-in via the Player Zone. True Poker $65,000 Points Race, $75k Gtd. Tournament The $65,000 Points Race has become a monthly staple and players joining the race today still have a chance to get on the leaderboard. A $50 prize is for the taking for currently just over 1100 points. On January 29th, True Poker will be offering a $75,000 guaranteed tournament. Players can enter by buying in directly for $109 for satellites for a low as $2.20. NoiQ €60,000 VIP Races There are two remaining promotion periods remaining in NoiQ Poker's main VIP Races. The Entraction Network room will be giving away €15,000 each from January 16th to January 24th and January 24th to January 31st. Cash prizes are awarded to the top 100 VIP Points earners during each period.
In November, Everleaf Gaming unveiled $1 rake caps in an effort to increase traffic on all US dollar tables on the network. The promotion was originally billed as being offered through the end of 2011 but in mid-December Minted Poker announced that the offer would be extended through January. Reducing rake will almost always receive a positive reaction from players and this promotion was no exception. Despite the goodwill and vows from players to support poker rooms that lower rake versus increase the rake, Everleaf has not received a material bump from the temporarily policy. According to PokerScout, traffic on the network was slightly positive at first -- up around 10% -- and then turned flat throughout the rest of the month of November, before a decline in December due to seasonal trends and a new unpopular policy. In early December, Everleaf soured some of the positive mood by instituting a policy limiting the amount of money that players could win on euro tables (€750 per week), a move meant to improve the network’s ecosystem and reward depositing players. Needless to say, the policy was not welcomed by players and the network has seen a bit of decline since the policy was put in place. It should be noted that some of the decline can be attributed to seasonal trends. Interestingly, the €750 cap on euro tables should give players even more reason to play on the dollar tables. Unfortunately for players favoring the dollar tables; however, historically most of the Everleaf games that run are at the euro tables. That appears to be changing to some extent with so much in favor of playing the dollar tables. While players at the US dollar tables are enjoying $1 rake caps and free of winning limits, the players at euro tables have to put with the caps and the highest rake in the industry – 6%-7% up to €5 at some tables. Part of the reason for the lack of action at dollar tables is due to some skins offering euro-only tables, but it’s still puzzling that euro tables are still outnumbering US dollar tables by a 3:1 margin during much of the day, despite the overwhelming benefits to play at the dollar tables. Surely players don’t like paying rake, but I think it’s at least somewhat indicative that they don’t mind it much when in the presence of juicy games, plenty of action (relative to dollar tables) and promotions that encourage the generation of rake. I welcome the promotion from Everleaf for another month and hope that they continue it indefinitely to increase the action at the dollar tables. As Pokeraddict alluded to in his post on the subject, this is relatively low risk endeavor by the Everleaf sites to develop some buzz and drum up U.S. business from players that may not have otherwise given them a good look. With cashouts on the network among the best in the industry right now for U.S. players, why not support lower rake? At PAS, publishers can promote Minted Poker and Cellino Poker, each awarding 40% rakeback to players.
Black Friday has officially claimed Cereus Network sites Absolute Poker and UB.com as parent company, Blanca Games, has submitted plans to liquidate with a goal of eventually repaying players a portion of the balances owed to them. On the U.S. legislative front, a hearing was held on Tuesday by the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee discussing the future of online poker in the country. Read about these stories and more in this edition of the PAS Weekly Industry Update. Cereus Network Submits Plan for Liquidation: On Friday, the Cereus Network effectively closed down with an announcement that the battered poker room had submitted a liquidation plan to the U.S. Department of Justice for approval. The network has operated since Black Friday to non-US players, but has been a shadow of its former self with traffic down over 99% from Black Friday levels. Players had been receiving very sporadic cashouts of $250-$500 in the weeks leading up to the liquidation announcement. New House Hearing on Online Poker: The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee held a two hour plus meeting on online poker in the United States. The mostly positive meeting focused on safeguards and consumer protection that would be required if and when online poker is regulated in the country. After the hearing, Chairwoman Rep Mary Bono Mack stated her desire to hold another hearing in the near future but to not expect any legislation to be attached to the Deficit Reduction package that must be decided upon by November 23rd. Check out PAS's summary on the day's events. Full Tilt Poker Updates: : Early in the week, the Irish Times reported that Full Tilt Poker had made 180 of their 500 staff members "redundant," a plan that had Full Tilt Poker employees first became aware of in September. In some interesting news, multiple players reported that they received telephone surveys from a magazine with ties to the Tapie investment group. In the survey, players were asked to choose between one of three options on how they would like to receive their funds in a hypothetical repayment scenario: 1) buying shares of Full Tilt with part of their funds 2) cash out immediately with a undermined penalty or 3) be paid in full but released in incremental payments over a year. The survey is noteworthy because it indicates the variety of payment resolutions that Tapie and his group are considering at this time as negotiations continue. Everleaf Lowers Rake on USD Tables: In an effort to attract more U.S. players to their tables, the Everleaf Gaming Network will be slashing the maximum rake on all US Dollar tables to $1 through December. The move will primarily affect players at No Limit and Pot Limit tables. There is currently very little action at Limit tables on Everleaf, but players seated at these tables at limits of $2/$4 and above will also see the rake greatly reduced. Latest Traffic Update from PokerScout: PokerScout's latest traffic report details a 1.2% traffic drop after a healthy gain the previous week. An exception to the trend was Merge Gaming, which saw it traffic increase another 7% after soaring 13% the week prior, up 20% since the network began accepting U.S. players for the first time since June. Merge Gaming is once again a top 10 room in terms of online poker traffic, with more than 2200 cash game players on the site during peak times. Jottings: Entraction rakeback policy and VIP program change...Operators face difficult regulatory regime in Germany...UK unlikely to see Gaming Act changes in near future...Top five CPAs from U.S. poker rooms...Fertitta purchases CyberArts...Ongame promises to fight bots...Maryland Gov proves online poker battle is about the money...D-Amato distances himself from Full Tilt Poker.
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