In recent weeks, the excitement has gone up a notch in the online poker room . Whimsical " hands ", risky " carpet " ... Regulars sometimes find it difficult to navigate among the avalanche of new players who do not hesitate to favor instinct rather than strategy. Stuck at home, they found an activity to occupy their time, with the secret hope that it would make them rich while staying on their sofa. Because it is containment that pushed thousands of French people to launch out.
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" Online poker is experiencing an unprecedented boom , " confirms Aurélien Guiglini, poker manager at Winamax. “ Our existing players have started playing again and are playing more. But above all, we also register 5,000 new accounts per day . ” An unprecedented figure for the online gambling site whose turnover for poker has almost tripled since the start of the confinement.
Same story on the side of Arjel, the regulatory authority for online games. “During normal periods, there are 300,000 active player accounts per week. There, he has 500,000, " confirms its president, Charles Coppolani, who adds: " While the average spending of players in poker in 2019 was around 5 million euros per week, it increased to more than 15 million ” .
New players are not confined to public games, open to everyone. Many prefer private tournaments to them, which they can organize themselves and for which they define the amounts, explains Aurélien Guigliani. Virtual games, like poker evenings that containment now prohibits. " Normally, we have a few dozen a day. We have gone to 4000 tournaments which bring together 40,000 players per day, ”he enthuses.
Sports betting activity drops 90%
Among these newcomers, French people looking for a playful occupation, but also punters in search of opportunities. And for good reason, for lack of sports competitions, sports betting knows a fall of 90% of their activity. A rout for online gambling, the turnover of which is mainly based on these bets.
According to figures from Arjel, sports betting stakes represented 5.56 billion euros in 2019 and 880 million euros in terms of gross gaming revenue (PBJ), i.e. stakes minus the earnings, and therefore, the real expense of the players. In comparison, poker generated 271 million euros in PBJ in the same year, more than three times less.
If poker compensates "almost" for the losses of online bets, at Winamax, we remain cautious. "We know it will fall back after confinement. It is very likely that, when people can get out, they will want everything except to play poker. But maybe some of them will nevertheless continue to visit our site, ”we hope.
"The main risk is the loss of social relationships"
An ambition that has become the fear of aid and prevention platforms against gambling addiction. "Playing involves risks" , especially when one is playing poker. "The main risk is the loss of social relationships that is specific to this game. When you do sports parties, it is instantaneous, while you can play poker for a very long time," explains Charles Copppolani, who recommends to participants "To set a budget and a time limit" . This instruction will soon become mandatory for online gaming sites but that some are already implementing such as Winamax, which requires during registration to set a limit on playing time and wagering. If the player wishes to modify them, he must wait 48 hours "in order to give him time to think about it," says the site.
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A precaution with limited effects, however. "I set myself 5000 euros as a limit to be wide but I know that if I reach it, I will be in the red," testifies Valentin 28 years, confirmed player. At the start of confinement, because he was unable to work, he considerably increased his playing time, up to seven hours a day. Mainly on private tournaments with his friends, many of whom have created an account where he reactivated on this occasion. Now that he's telecommuting, he's only spending five hours a week online poker.
"It's not gain that makes you addict, it's losing"
If the risk of addiction is present for any new poker player, it is all the more to be feared during this time of confinement, warns the Arjel. Especially for people prone to this type of addiction. For Olivier Kramarz, therapist specialized in addiction and vice-president of France patients addiction experts (Fpea), it is above all a “risk of relapse” which is to be feared. According to him, "generalized anxiety, financial problems, isolation or promiscuity are aggravating factors of consumption" . Especially since the idleness imposed by the coronavirus epidemic offers more time to play.
Like Arjel, Olivier Kramarz insists on the need to set a playing time not to be exceeded. "It can be good to play with a stopwatch on your phone and when the latter rings to indicate that the playing time is over, to stop regardless of the situation in which the player finds himself , " he recommends. , warning of the risk of wanting to "do it all over again" .
Cautious in his stakes, Valentin sets an amount not to be exceeded. But above all, "if the money I have deposited on my account on the platform reaches 0, I stop. It's a pleasure, but I have other priorities, "he says, recognizing that there is a great temptation to replenish his account to continue playing. “It is not gain that makes you addict, it is to lose. The idea is that the more you win, the more you want to play, but that's not true. There is, at the beginning, a gain phase during which we hang on to the games, it makes us happy, it amuses us, it relaxes us. But from the moment you start to lose, that's where the risk is, because we need to rebuild. We are going to start borrowing money, lying ... ” A hellish spiral from which it is very difficult to get out.