PokerStars Players Ship nearly $3/4 mil for Haiti

The PokerStars Haiti Appeal was concluded yesterday and this morning PokerStars posted the final numbers for the PokerStars Haiti Appeal on their blog. Final total, just under $1.5 million.

PokerStars players donated $746,390.26 which means a $1,492,780.52 donation to the Red Cross after PokerStars' match. This was the largest PokerStars had raised in one of their charity drives.

$50,000 also went to UNICEF when PokerStars met Alyssa Milano's Tweet Challenge to raise money for Haiti.

PokerStars recognized their players contributions with the following statement:

Poker is a solitary pursuit, one that some player construct around the idea that greed is good and the selfish means to the profitable end can be forgiven. In times like these, it is refreshing to see that the poker community can set aside profit motives and give away hard-earned money for no other reason than it is the right thing to do.

Many thanks to all who gave and organized fundraising efforts.. You are a credit to our community.

It looks like around half of the money raised through the Haiti tournaments were from players donating $50 or less and around half of that was from the $10 and lower tourneys. Not everyone is a high stakes player with a huge bankroll, not everyone is even a winning player and with the economy the way it is finances can be strained. Throw in being right after the holidays and giving money to people you don't probably wasn't on your to-do list. But seeing people suffering and fighting to overcome their adversity it's difficult to not have compassion and thanks to PokerStars every dollar players were willing to spare turned into two which turned into ~$1.5mil.