The best rakeback deals

Using examples of the winning, break-even, and even the losing player, the purpose here is to show that no matter what limits of poker one is playing online, that the effect rakeback will have on their bankroll will prove to be positive.

The terms 'winning poker player', 'break-even poker player', and 'losing poker player' need to be given some sort of definition. For our purposes here, we will assume that the winning poker player wins 2 big bets per hundred hands ('big bets per hundred hands' will be denoted as 'bb/100 hands), the break-even poker player wins at 0 bb/100 hands, and the losing poker player wins at -1 bb/100 hands. As will become apparent, the actual limits being played is not important for our purposes , but in order for the explanation to be understood abstractly and conceptually, a $3-$6 game is going to be used as an example throughout the rest of the article. Using the definition of a winning player from above, the $3-$6 player will win $12 (2 bb) every 100 hands. The L will win -$6 every 100 hands. The bb/100 hands is not taking rakeback into consideration.

The average $3/$6 10 handed game will have a pot that is raked $2.00 (it is a little bit more, but for our purposes here, $2.00 will be an easier number to work with). This means that each player contributed $0.20 to the rake. The player will receive 35% of that $2.00 back for a $0.07 refund.

To clarify, the Monthly Gross Rake (MGR) is calculated by dividing the amount of players dealt in the hand, by the amount of total rake taken from the pot (10 players / $2 = $.020). To figure the rakeback monetary amount received per hand, multiply rakeback percentage by the MGR per hand ($0.35 * $0.20 = $0.07). Then multiply the rakeback per hand by 100 to see how how much rakeback will be earned per 100 hands ($.07 * 100 hands = $7.00).

With the $7.00 per 100 hands, the winning $3/$6 poker player earns 150% of her winrate, the breakeven player now shows a $7.00/per 100 hands win/rate and the losing player will be slightly better than break-even (provided that he doesn't lose more than $6 per hour). If a player plays two tables at a time, they will be able to play approximately 150 hands an hour. This means that the winning player of 2bb/100 will win $28.50 on average for every hour she plays. Rakeback will have made up $10.50 of her poker winnings.

The above examples are using very specific definitions of 'winning' and 'losing' poker players and also only takes $3-$6 limit hold-em into consideration. Using the above, one can easily deduce how much rakeback they will earn every 100 hands. Even players that are winning players at lower limits will earn a decent percentage of a bb/100 hands even if they don't win at a rate of 2bb/100. A losing poker player of more than 1bb/100 hands, will still benefit from receiving rakeback at any limits.

As long as the formulas above are used, it will be close to impossible to show that rakeback is not worth receiving if there is any significant amount of hands played in a month. rakeback

The best rakeback deals

Members also have the option of having their money kept in segregated accounts.

Quick deposit and faster cashouts: The overall format of the game enables quick deposit of money via plastic money, e-wallets and wire transfers. This is also true for the cashout plan, where a person gets to withdraw his earned money whenever he wants. Being a member of Pokerstars Rakeback allows you to have even faster transactions due to higher bankrolls.

Once you enroll for the Pokerstars Rakeback program and become a VIP member, you can start playing with real money. It will also help you accumulate Frequent Player Points, which provide you with better schemes.

Rooms such as Pokerstars forbid affiliates from offering Rakeback to their players and prefer to keep their loyalty scheme in house. This is ultimately is bad for the players but good for the shareholders whose interests the directors (rightly) put at the centre of their strategy.

The fish bear the brunt of these policies and regulars who earn money from exploiting the weaknesses in fish are indirectly affected. Rake is expensive. To understand just how expensive it is, take a look at the affiliate cost per acquisition rates paid to affiliates for signing up a player. The maximum offered by Full Tilt poker is $150 or 35% of lifetime rake. The net contribution by these players to the Poker room is therefore at least $430. If these fish were not raked so heavily (or were offered Rakeback by an independent body) then they would have an additional $115 in the bankroll - that's money that could be going to the sharks rather than the poker room.

Your earnings are not really a consideration for Poker rooms. It is important to appreciate that there are over 250 poker rooms across 60 networks - many of which make losses on an ongoing basis. Operating costs are extremely high and the expenditure on marketing is vast. Rake is a hidden cost to most players as it is quite small and taken frequently. Also, Poker rooms do not present statistics to players on exactly how much rake they are paying.

However, attracting high raking players is also important to poker rooms. Rakeback is an excellent way of facilitating that. A popular strategy by places such as Fat Poker is to ramp up the rake and offer extremely attractive Rakeback rates in the hope that player's won't research the net cost of rake - the net cost of rake is ultimately the figure that matters to the professional player but it is ambiguous to calculate once you consider temporary bonuses and varying levels of rake with different numbers of players.

The problem with bonuses is that they don't encourage long term play, once the bonus runs out (during which the effective cash back can be greater than 100%), players move onto the next site, often within the same network. Rather than focusing on the quality of play by investing in clean, fast and attractive software, these unprofitable poker rooms are engaged in a race to the bottom. Rather than each poker skin colluding for the greater good of the network (i.e. attracting poor players) they instead focus on attracting the high raking sharks which ultimately follow the fish. best rakeback deals

The best rakeback deals

A popular strategy by places such as Fat Poker is to ramp up the rake and offer extremely attractive Rakeback rates in the hope that player's won't research the net cost of rake - the net cost of rake is ultimately the figure that matters to the professional player but it is ambiguous to calculate once you consider temporary bonuses and varying levels of rake with different numbers of players.

The problem with bonuses is that they don't encourage long term play, once the bonus runs out (during which the effective cash back can be greater than 100%), players move onto the next site, often within the same network. Rather than focusing on the quality of play by investing in clean, fast and attractive software, these unprofitable poker rooms are engaged in a race to the bottom. Rather than each poker skin colluding for the greater good of the network (i.e. attracting poor players) they instead focus on attracting the high raking sharks which ultimately follow the fish. It is a false economy and helps explain the polarisation in fortunes between the likes of Pokerstars, Full Tilt and Party Poker compared with the rest of pack. These leaders discourage or forbid Rakeback and are not networks - maybe the likes of Cake and Merge should rethink their strategy.

Rakeback is just part of online card rooms. Like multi-tabling and isolating limpers, it's pretty much automatic to higher volume, regular players. PokerStars Rakeback can have a huge effect on your bankroll and winrate. Just how big of an impact? Many people don't even realize the actual numbers. In fact, the rake can be nearly 5 big blinds/100 hands (even higher at the lower stakes)! To put that in numbers, if you are a 100NL player, every 100,000 hands, you could be paying more than $5,000 just in rake! So if you play 100,000 hands and let's just say you run break-even against the players, you actually would end up down $5,000 because of the rake.

Now let's say you have rakeback (or equivalent) of 30%, meaning, of course, that you get 30% of your rake given back to you. In this case you would get $1,500 back, which would only leave you down $3,500. This could obviously be a huge difference between being a losing player and breakeven, or breakeven and profitable. And if you are already a winning player, rakeback is just gravy. If you are a high volume player, you might as well be getting money back while you play.

Some might find it interesting and curious that the largest poker site in the world is one that technically does not offer rakeback. There are a lot of great reasons to play at PokerStars, however, those that don't play at PokerStars would argue that they can't get rakeback at Stars and they don't offer many deposit or reload bonuses, so why would I play there? That's where they are wrong. It is true that you can't get third party rakeback like you can at many other sites. However, PokerStars realizes that their valued regulars need to get some value for their precious time. This is where their VIP Club comes in.

PokerStars Rakeback has six levels to their VIP Club.

best rakeback deals