Online Poker Revenue in New Jersey Hits New Low

An unfortunate milestone happened for New Jersey in October after that state’s online poker industry recorded the lowest monthly online poker revenue in its small history.

Things have not gotten better for the state’s online poker market as it officially recorded a new low in its monthly revenue in November.

A total of $1.877 million in revenue was recorded in New Jersey last month, a 4.6 per cent decrease in the $1.97 million recorded by the state in October. The revenue is a far cry from the state’s performance in the first quarter of this year, when it had recorded over $3 million of revenue each month.

In fact, if the present trends are any indicator of the future, the next few months could be even worse for New Jersey given that November’s revenues marked the third straight time that online poker revenues had declined. It also marks the second time in the history of New Jersey’s regulated online poker industry that total revenues have fallen below the $2 million mark.

There could potentially still be hope that the falls are just temporary, however. Online poker revenues in the state were at their highest between December 2013 and April 2014, with revenues for all months being over $2.5 million.

Should that trend repeat itself between now and next April, it will be a welcome change for the state and the networks that operate within its market.

However, New Jersey’s online poker market formally began to operate in November last year. This helps create the potential that monthly revenues for the first five months were attributed to the possibility that online poker players were initially intrigued by the market.

The ‘novelty has worn off’ theory is boosted by the fact that total online poker revenues since April 2014 have barely been able to get past the $2.25 million mark, and have now gone below $2 million.

If the novelty has in fact worn off, then there is the possibility that the downward trend seen in the past few months will continue into the future. This could pose some problems for New Jersey based networks with smaller market shares and player averages, which could face even further decreases in numbers should revenues continue to fall.

The lower revenues have not affected Party Borgata and WSOP.com in any major way, however. Both networks continue to lead online poker in New Jersey with seven-day player averages of 160 and 120 respectively.