Online Poker Traffic Rises Nearly 1 Percent

The holiday week resulted in an 0.9 percent rise in online poker traffic according to monitoring website PokerScout.com.

Player counts dropped steeply on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Eve, dipping even lower than last year's holidays. The plunge was to be expected, however, as the holidays fell on weekends this year and a larger-than-usual number of players took to the roads and skies to spend time with their families.

There may not have been a rise if not for the severe winter weather that gripped much of the Eastern US that week.  Much of the New York metropolitan area including the city itself was paralyzed for a number of days following a blizzard that dumped upwards of 30 inches of snow in some spots. 

The big movers for the week were not US-facing online poker rooms but rather the European sites.

Winamax.fr picked up three spots, finishing the week in 10th place. IPN rose one notch to 11th. Microgaming and Entraction Networks each dropped two spots to 12th and 13th place, respectively.

- Patrick Flanagan, Gambling911.com