The PokerStars Trio Series, the first tournament series to celebrate the new shared player pool of Portugal, France and Spain, exceeded its advertised Euro 5 million guarantee with a total prize pool of Euro 6,457,486, the poker provider revealed in a statement Thursday.
The Trio Series celebrated PokerStars becoming the first online operator to offer a shared player pool between the three countries since Portugal joined the union last month, and saw 40,816 unique players take part in the 78-event schedule from June 3-13.
The Main Event surpassed its Euro 500,000 guarantee to reach Euro 615,195, with winner ‘Ineed1000ETH’ from Spain beating 2,645 other players to take home Euro 71,917.47.
PokerStars’ success with the Trio Series follows France and Spain’s Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP), which surpassed its record-breaking Euro 10 million guarantee to reach Euro 11,768,035, the company reports.
Earlier in the year, PokerStars FRESH (France Espania Hold’em) Series for French and Spanish players also exceeded its Euro 5 million guarantee, reaching Euro 6,149,751.
“We’ve had great success with our various series in shared liquidity regions and it’s brilliant to see the Trio Series carry on this trend,” said Severin Rasset, director of product innovation and operations at The Stars Group.
“We believe that this has strengthened our offering in Southern Europe. Players benefit from the shared player pool between Portugal, Spain and France in all aspects of the poker offering and we hope that Italian players will benefit from the same great offer soon.”
Regulators in Italy have reiterated their intentions to join the shared market with Portugal, France and Spain. The Stars Group intends to seek approval to enter into such shared player pool market if and when it becomes available, the statement advised.