Pokerstars: "Overall Impact Will Be a Rake Increase of 4%"
Published on March 22nd, 2016 2:25 pm EST
Lost in the warm and fuzzy feelings of yesterday's launch of "Pokerstars NJ" was the announcement that Pokerstars will be introducing a "revised pricing" structure as of March 28th, 2016. Pokerstars, which has infuriated many players over the past year or so with their rake increases and changes to its VIP rewards program, revealed that the "revised pricing" will result in a "rake increase of 4%".
Pokerstars is justifying these changes by saying that they will "still have the lowest overall pricing of any major online poker operator". In fact, the Pokerstars press release included a graph comparing the site's proposed rake structure at $0.02/$0.05 - $5/$10 NLHE and PLO against that of their major competitors.
Many players, especially those who try to grind out a living online, are outraged by the rake increases, especially given the events of the past year. Daniel "KidPoker" Negreanu has also been on the receiving end of a fair amount of vitriol today, as he serves as one of the faces of the site.
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Here are the new rake changes, courtesy of Pokerstars.com:
"-Spin & Go rake will be increased by one percentage point for buy-ins from $1 to $30 (two percentage points in $3 buy-in). $0.25, $60 and $100 buy-ins will not change.
-In multi-table tournaments, PokerStars will match the practices deployed in our closed liquidity markets where rebuys and add-ons incur fees similar to the original entry. These tournaments represent approximately 12% of the current main schedule.
-MTT hyper-turbo rake will be increased to 5%.
-Cap and percentage of rake will be increased in some no limit and pot limit ring games, mainly heads-up. Some rake caps will be lowered. Limit games will not be affected."
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When Amaya, Inc., a publicly traded company, purchased Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker in the summer of 2014, many people feared the worst. Pokerstars' player-friendly environment, they said, would be discarded in favor of increased profits for shareholders. For those people, yesterday's rake increase announcement is just more validation.
Source: Pokerstars.com - Pokerstars Announces Revised Pricing
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Filed Under: Online Poker Rooms
