In poker, money is at the forefront of everything, and with that comes all sorts of informal (and formal) financial deals between players. As high roller and super high roller tournaments have increased in popularity, staking deals have also become much more common, as even the deepest-pocketed players often can’t or don’t want to plunk down $25,000, $50,000, or $100,000 for a buy-in.
But with all these deals sometimes comes problems. Earlier this week, poker pro Dylan Linde made a series of social media posts explaining an issue he has run into with high stakes tournament pro David Peters.
In the posts, Linde said he “deeply regrets” getting involved financially with Peters, an experience which dates back to last summer. Peters, Linde said, bought a piece of his action in the 2025 World Series of Poker $50,000 Pot-Limit Omaha High Roller event, which Linde won for over $2.1 million. Linde paid Peters his share of the winnings in cash a few days later.
A few months later, Linde said he was at the Triton Jeju festival (likely the Triton Poker Super High Roller Series Jeju II by WPT Global in September) and Peters again bought a piece of his action in two events. In this case, though, Peters did not give Linde the money right away, as he said he just didn’t have cash at that moment. The tournaments didn’t go Linde’s way, and Peters owed him $50,000 for the buy-in share that he promised. The two men agreed that they would settle up at the PokerGO Tour’s Poker Masters later that month.
Linde said that Peters, who has nearly $50 million in live tournament earnings, did not show. They spoke again, agreeing to meet up at the North American Poker Tour in November. Again, Peters was not there. Linde asked Peters to pay him before “Bahamas,” which seems to mean WSOP Paradise last December. He gave Peters his bank wire info, but never received the payment.
“I start to get a bit worried,” Linde wrote.
Linde inquired as to the problem and Peters said he was “trying to free up liquidity and will keep me updated.” It was radio silence after that unless Linde initiated the conversation, and he eventually warned Peters that if he didn’t pay by the end of February, he would “out him.”
That prompted Peters to send Linde $12,000, which bought him some time. On April 1, Peters paid Linde another $15,000, but then said he couldn’t pay the rest. It was at that point that Linde decided to make the story public to warn others about doing business with Peters.
Responding to someone on X, Linde said he is normally sympathetic to people having financial troubles, but in this case, there was “months of obfuscation.”
David Peters has yet to make a public statement about the matter. If he has spoken to Dylan Linde since Linde’s posts, Linde has not made it known.