My friend made some good money playing poker. He was probably in top50 in the world 2 years ago when he quit before fulfilling his dream of making it to the WSOP final table (got close though on 2nd attempt). He thinks that poker is dying now because of competition, especially with software and bots (which are not all machine-learning AI based). His wife started to play professionally around 2 years ago and had $100k+ best month since then. He says that she has more potential than him because somehow she's more cold-blooded and her brain works faster.
He invested a lot of money in different businesses, some profitable some don't, some failed.
Most notable is top2 massage company in Ukraine offering services for IT companies.
Most notable failure - he tried to open his poker room with Chinese poker, burned a lot of money for development and marketing, had a lot of bugs in his software and Chinese poker fad faded away while he was fixing them with a different company. Max online was around 40 people playing the lowest stakes.
Another friend still plays but is not that successful. He spent over 7 years studying to become a surgeon and worked for 3 years, playing poker in spare time. Had an opportunity to emigrate and get a nice medical salary (in Ukraine surgeons get around $200/month..., a bit more in private hospitals but still nothing compared to 1st countries), but refused it, quit his job and now playing poker full time. He also was a coach on PokerStrategy for quite a while. I don't know his average earnings, but he recently had first profitable week after full 3 months of losses day to day.
They play on some illegal Chinese online rooms now with richer fish and less competition. Some fish is regular there, constantly losing huge sums of money for fun. But it's still one fishy player and a lot of regulars at the table at a time.
The first friend and his wife play few high stake tables, second is grinding 18-20+ tables mid stakes.
The casino and betting booker earn more than players and although there are some millionaires from poker, there are a lot more business millionaires.
He invested a lot of money in different businesses, some profitable some don't, some failed.
Most notable is top2 massage company in Ukraine offering services for IT companies.
Most notable failure - he tried to open his poker room with Chinese poker, burned a lot of money for development and marketing, had a lot of bugs in his software and Chinese poker fad faded away while he was fixing them with a different company. Max online was around 40 people playing the lowest stakes.
Another friend still plays but is not that successful. He spent over 7 years studying to become a surgeon and worked for 3 years, playing poker in spare time. Had an opportunity to emigrate and get a nice medical salary (in Ukraine surgeons get around $200/month..., a bit more in private hospitals but still nothing compared to 1st countries), but refused it, quit his job and now playing poker full time. He also was a coach on PokerStrategy for quite a while. I don't know his average earnings, but he recently had first profitable week after full 3 months of losses day to day.
They play on some illegal Chinese online rooms now with richer fish and less competition. Some fish is regular there, constantly losing huge sums of money for fun. But it's still one fishy player and a lot of regulars at the table at a time.
The first friend and his wife play few high stake tables, second is grinding 18-20+ tables mid stakes.
The casino and betting booker earn more than players and although there are some millionaires from poker, there are a lot more business millionaires.
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