It’s been revealed that the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement (NJDGE) has made an agreement with the UK Gambling Commission to share online poker liquidity. The agreement has just been made provisionally, as detailed have yet to be finalised or settled on. Three states in the USA have legalized online poker (Delaware, Nevada, and New Jersey) and two of these states (Nevada and Delaware) share liquidity across most of its poker games.

Instead of than looking into possibilities with joining these two US states, it was reported that New Jersey has focused its attention on the United Kingdom. The state’s gaming regulator has made moved to come to an agreement in principle with the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC) to share liquidity if issues can be worked out between the pair.

The NJDGE wrote to online gaming operators in New Jersey and the United Kingdom asking them to outline ways in which a possible shared liquidity system could function.

This new development comes despite Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval recently announcing in May that he was ready to sign an interstate shared poker liquidity settlement with the New Jersey board.

The director of NJDGE, David Rebuck said that the state is focusing on the UK because of the more significant impact the country’s much larger population (of over 65 million people) would have. The New Jersey online gaming market compared with the to the much smaller population of under four million in Nevada and Delaware combined.

“With nine million people in New Jersey, and more than 63 million in the United Kingdom, this would mean a massive increase in liquidity for New Jersey operators,” Rebuck shared with GGB. “Even when you discount children and non-gamblers, it gives us access to a market that is very familiar with online gaming. That number is one-fifth of the total U.S. population.”

Commentators have suggested that another reason New Jersey decided to focus on the United Kingdom rather than Nevada and Delaware is due to the number of online gaming companies operating in each jurisdiction. Delaware and Nevada both utilize the 888poker software platform, while New Jersey regulated gaming operators currently take advantage of three platforms in PokerStars, Partypoker, and 888poker. PokerStars is currently forbidden from obtaining a license there due to a “bad-actor” clause embedded in the state’s online gaming legislation.

Every major online gaming platform has a footprint in the United Kingdom, including Betfair Poker, thanks to relatively lenient poker legislation there.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 25th, 2016 at 2:54 pm and is filed under UK Poker News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

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