Interstate Poker Traffic in Michigan Up 32% at PokerStars; BetMGM is Next to Join
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In the history of Michigan online poker, this year has been quite historic. Michigan is the nation’s top online poker jurisdiction.
Michigan gamers now have the opportunity to compete against players from other states while playing online poker. PokerStars MI and PokerStars NJ went into shared liquidity on January 1st, marking the beginning of that.
Since then, Michigan’s cash traffic has increased annually by 18.7%. Due in part to PokerStars’ growing market share, Michigan has surpassed Pennsylvania as the US’s largest online poker market.
Furthermore, this is only the tip of the iceberg. With BetMGM’s recent announcement of intentions to include shared liquidity on its online poker skins, there will likely be an even higher future demand for Michigan online poker.
Both Michigan and PokerStars Benefit from Shared Liquidity
Less than two years after going online, PokerStars Michigan and New Jersey combined their player pools on January 1. Eleven months later, traffic to PokerStars MI had increased by 32% YoY.
When online poker became legal in Michigan, shared liquidity was taken into consideration, which helped the state quickly get to where it is now. Before its shared liquidity started, PokerStars, the state’s first online poker room, was the clear leader in Michigan.
PokerStars was able to widen the difference with the other websites in Michigan because of shared liquidity. The traffic to BetMGM Poker MI has decreased by 10%, while WSOP.com MI has decreased by 4%, indicating that some of its players have shifted to PokerStars’ more extensive services.
Additionally, overall traffic has increased for the year, thus PokerStars’ increases have outpaced those of BetMGM and WSOP. This implies that player pools with ring-fencing are less appealing than interstate online poker.
