New Jersey iPoker Down 2.8% to $1.91m in October

New Jersey’s iGaming market had plenty to celebrate in October, with revenues hitting their second biggest monthly total to date of $12.86 million, a huge 35.6% more than the $9,484,932 generated in the same month last year. Only March 2015’s tally of $13.16 million was higher, of which 83% ($10.9m) was derived from online casino games, and the remaining 17% ($2.22m) from online poker.
The balance between the two verticals continues to alter, though, and in October online casinos games had increased their share of the market to 85.1%, while iPoker contracted to a mere 14.9% of revenues. In fact, New Jersey’s two poker operators generated $1,913,403 from their sites last month, which despite being 7.4% more than September’s figure, was still 2.8% down on the $1.967 million collected last October.
Continuing to lead the Garden State’s iPoker market is the Borgata (PartyPoker/Pala Interactive) with $1,079,478 in revenues last month, while Caesars Interactive (888/WSOP) was a little further behind on $833,925. Next year is likely to see a major shake-up of the market, though, after PokerStars utilizes the New Jersey iGaming license it was granted on September 30th. Holding back quicker entry into the market is the matter of $428,000 in outstanding funds still waiting to be claimed by former PokerStars customers who used to play on the site pre-Black Friday. As a PokerStars statement explained recently:
“Under New Jersey’s Uniform Unclaimed Property Act, we are required to make a diligent attempt to renew contact.. If contact is not renewed by December 28, 2015, we are required by law to transfer these funds to the custody of the State of New Jersey”.
While New Jersey’s iPoker industry wanes, the state’s online casino vertical continues to shine, and generated $10,950,532 in October, marking a 6.3% improvement year-over-year. Furthermore, that figure was New Jersey’s highest monthly online casino revenues to date, surpassing the previous record of $10,937,994 reported in March this year.
Finally, New Jersey’s eight casinos generated $191.6 million in October, 3.1% less than than the same month in 2014. Including online revenues, however, that amount increases to $204.5 million, representing a slight 1.3% contraction on last year’s total of $207.2 million.