Two online poker skins on Playtech’s iPoker network have struck a deal to begin sharing player liquidity.

In what’s being billed as a first for regulated European market operators, Finland’s RAY and Austria’s Win2Day have agreed to form a joint poker network allowing each site’s players to match poker wits against players in the other site’s country.

The deal was formally approved by the Finnish Ministry of the Interior on December 8. Slots operator RAY has been a Playtech client since 2010 while Win2Day joined the Playtech party this year. The deal follows Playtech firming up a new online casino content deal with FRV Finland, the new national gaming entity encompassing RAY, Veikkaus and Fintoto.

Playtech COO Shimon Akad expressed pride at being “the first company to provide two great brands with a poker network and series of leading products that will combine to form the first ever cross-border poker network.” (It must be noted that the ‘first’ claim applies only if you ignore all dot-com poker operators.)