Monarch
Ossi Ketola spent nine years running a Counter-Strike skin gambling site, walked away from it to build a casino, and then played the two largest pots in televised poker history inside a single week. He lost most of the matches.
Who he is
Ketola founded and ran CSGOEmpire for nine years, one of the largest skin-gambling platforms in Counter-Strike. He has said the site was generating over a hundred million a year when he moved his focus to Duel — which, financially speaking, is a strange decision and he has never pretended otherwise.
Duel is the result: a crypto casino built around games that take no house edge, with a stated ambition of 100% RTP and a founder who puts his own name and face on it. In an industry where ownership normally sits behind a chain of offshore holding companies, that is unusual on its own.
Cyprus, August 2025 — the $15 million loss
The poker run began at the Onyx Super High Roller Series in North Cyprus, in a day-long series of heads-up matches against Dan "Jungleman" Cates.
Ketola was ahead at one stage, having taken the earlier matches. Then the stakes went up: the pair played a combined $32 million across the final three games and Cates won all three. Ketola finished roughly $15 million down over two days, in what was at the time the biggest televised poker game ever played.
Most people would stop there. He called out Daniel Negreanu instead.
Jeju, September 2025 — seven nights, five opponents, $63 million
A month later he followed the high-stakes action to the Triton Super High Roller Series in Jeju, South Korea. He entered three tournaments and cashed one, but the tournaments were not the point. Over seven consecutive nights he challenged five different opponents to heads-up matches totalling more than $63 million in buy-ins.
| Opponent | Format | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Wiktor "Limitless" Malinowski | $2M match, then double | Lost ~$6M |
| Alex Foxen | Two nights | Won the $10.99M pot |
| Elias Talvitie | Heads-up | — |
| Kayhan Mokri | Two $3M matches | Mokri won 3 of 4 |
| Bjorn Li | $2M matches, then $16M duel | Li won 3 of 4; Monarch +$4M |
He finished the week down about $2 million. Given the volume, that is close to break-even — and considerably better than Cyprus.
The $11 million hand against Foxen
Alex Foxen is a three-time Triton champion and a two-time Global Poker Index Player of the Year. He dominated the first two nights and put Ketola $9 million down.
Then came the hand. Ketola opened the button to $150,000 from a $6.4 million stack with K♣J♥. Foxen defended his big blind with 8-6. Ketola came from behind to crack Foxen's flush and scoop a pot worth roughly $10.99 million — the largest ever seen in televised poker at that moment.
Worth noting for the archivists: YouTube pulled the livestream for a community guidelines violation before that hand was even dealt.
The $12.7 million hand against Bjorn Li
Five days later the record went again, and this one still stands.
Ketola had already lost three of four $2 million matches to Hong Kong's Bjorn Li. Rather than accept the series, he proposed a rematch at higher stakes — $8 million each on the table, a $16 million prize pool, played to the end.
At blinds of $40,000/$80,000, Ketola raised the button with 9♥9♣ and was three-bet by Li holding 8♥8♦. Ketola shoved for $6,350,000. Li tanked, then called. The board ran 6♠7♥10♥3♣2♠ and the nines held.
$12,700,000 — the largest pot in broadcast or livestreamed poker history. Li was left with $3.3 million and lost the rest roughly ninety minutes later.
Li won more matches across the series. Ketola left the session about $4 million up because of one hand.
What this has to do with the casino
Everything, and he is open about it. The Card Player writeup of the Jeju week put it plainly: as the owner of Duel, Ketola is taking on as many top poker names as will sit down with him while shining a light on his brand. It is a marketing budget shaped like a poker bankroll.
Look at the pattern across both trips and it is consistent. He challenges opponents who are better than him, at stakes high enough to make the stream unmissable, and he keeps coming back after losing. The losses are not incidental to the strategy — they are what makes it watchable.
It is the same logic that produced celebrity guests at the blackjack table and, this year, a fight promotion of Duel's own. Spectacle instead of advertising, scaled up until it cannot be ignored.
The reception
The poker world's response to the run has been mixed rather than celebratory. Part of that is the money — a wealthy outsider buying his way into the highest games annoys people who spent decades climbing to them. Part of it is that Ketola is a deliberately divisive figure who is not trying to be liked, at the tables or anywhere else.
What is not in dispute is the record. He challenged better players at stakes nobody else would take, kept coming back after losing eight figures, and holds both of the pots at the top of the list.
The casino he built instead
Zero house edge on the in-house games, 50% of the edge back on everything else.
Play at Duel