Following on the heels of Black Friday the Merge Gaming Network –which is now the #1 US-online poker network/site in the world—has announced it will cease offering rakeback to new players beginning on June 1, 2011.

There are a number of rumors that all rakeback will be stopped at the Merge Gaming Network, but this is entirely untrue. In fact you can still sign-up for a lifetime rakeback deal provided you join a Merge Gaming Network Site prior to the cutoff date.

Since Black Friday, Merge traffic has increased approximately 70%, which is likely the reason why they feel offering rakeback is no longer a necessity since they no longer are competing head-on with PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker for US market share.

Existing players’ rakeback deals will still be honored at this point, which means if you have not yet opened an account at a Merge Gaming Network online poker site now is the time to do so! If you join one of the network’s sites after May 31st you will only be eligible for the standard VIP deals offered to new players, on the other hand if you join between now and May 31, 2011 you can still take advantage of the massive 35% rakeback deals offered at sites like Lock Poker and Carbon Poker.

In addition to the rakeback deal, you will also be eligible for the site’s deposit bonus, and VIP program which is typically worth between 5%-15% in rakeback.

Tags: Black Friday, Deposit Bonus, Full tilt Poker, Gaming Network, Gaming Online, Gaming Site, Lifetime, Market Share, Online Poker, Poker Network, PokerStars, rakeback, Traffic, Vip Program

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 5th, 2011 at 11:48 am and is filed under Poker Industry News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.