How Much Cash Did The World Series Of Poker Main Event Champion Actually Win?

July 27, 2022 Europe Events & Announcements

Espen Jorstad topped the second-largest main event field in World Series of Poker history to bank a massive $10 million first-place prize.

But how much of that cash did Jorstad actually pocket for himself? Did he sell any pieces or have backers? Action with other players? What about taxes?

As it turns out, Jorstad had no problem sharing the numbers. The 34-year-old online poker streamer revealed his summer stats on Twitter, explaining that he had swaps with 14 different players. The swaps varied from 1% ($100,000) to 7.5% ($750,000), and left Jorstad with 56% of his own action ($5.6 million).

Of course, it’s probable that a few of the other 14 players also cashed in the main event, giving Jorstad back a rebate on some of those swaps.

“Very nice feeling to make my friends a lot of money!” Jorstad said.

Norway has a gambling tax rate of 28%, which would have represented $2.8 million of the total payout, or $1,568,000 of his share.

Fortunately, the Norwegian won’t be hit with any taxes as he now resides in the United Kingdom. The UK does not tax gambling winnings. He follows in the footsteps of last year’s champion Koray Aldemir, who dodged a hefty tax bill from his native Germany by living in nearby Austria instead.