rainer 🇭🇹🌹🌱

Kalshi raised $1B at a $22B valuation led by Coatue, with participation from Morgan Stanley, Sequoia, a16z, and others. In 2018, we were two kids who loved math, markets, and debate. And we had a dream: build the next generation financial market, where we capture a broader set of questions and harness the power of the masses to price them better than Wall Street. Kalshi was born to fulfill that dream. Today, most of these questions are traded indirectly, priced through imprecise proxies or negotiated bilaterally in opaque, restricted, relationship-driven markets. But thanks to our incredible community of users who make our markets work, Kalshi has the opportunity to change that by turning historically fragmented and untradeable risk into open, liquid, and standardized markets. We’ve seen this movie before. When interest rates, currencies, commodities, and crypto moved from dark to lit markets, volume did not just migrate: access expanded, new use cases emerged, and the opportunity grew by orders of magnitude. Today, Kalshi represents over 90% of US prediction market volume and the majority of activity globally, with annualized volume growing to $178B over the past 6 months. What started as retail is quickly becoming institutional — hedge funds, asset managers, prop firms, and insurers are beginning to trade, provide liquidity, and hedge real-world risk directly. The scope and scale of prediction markets are just beginning to take shape. We’re using this new capital to accelerate the institutional adoption underway — unlocking trillions in capital to facilitate active trading and risk management. Prediction markets are moving from early adoption to core financial infrastructure. This is just the beginning.

"How did you feel in that moment?" –– Mike Brown to the Knicks after showing them a video prior to Game 1 of the ECF of what they looked like after the Pacers eliminated them in last year's ECF, per Lisa Salters

I usually don't comment too much on media reporting on prediction markets. But the lies being spread are getting out of control. It's always healthy to debate new products and safety concerns, but smear campaigns against Kalshi and prediction markets are off the rails. We support nationwide regulations for ads and marketing of prediction markets; meanwhile, the American Gaming Association called proposed nationwide ad restrictions a "slap in the face" and opposed them. I am not surprised casinos are spreading lies against prediction markets. They’ve spent decades and hundreds of millions of dollars fighting back against federal standards for advertising and consumer protection, and more recently fighting back against market integrity in sports. Kalshi has done more to ban minors on its platform than most gambling platforms. Here are some of our measures: KYC with SSN and selfie verification at signup Face ID on by default 2FA when signing in Parent ID check portal How many of these measures do casinos or OSBs implement? Ask any state representative how conversations about Face IDs have gone with the gambling companies: a bill gets put forward, gambling companies spend millions to squash it, and nothing ever changes. If the casinos want to protect consumers, they would look to embrace much-needed nationwide, uniform regulation. There are constructive debates to be had about marketing, but pretending that casinos and the gambling industry are a model for platform safety or proper regulation is not serious. Currently, only 2 out of 40 states that allow OSBs also require them to gate minors from their social media advertising. Why? OSBs have been lobbying against these kinds of requirements for a decade. BetMGM sent 3000 marketing emails directly to minors in February of this year. Kalshi is not perfect. But we are working to address these kinds of challenges and set a new standard for our industry. Instead of smears, let's pass nationwide legislation to ban minor marketing and make safer platforms: face IDs, selfie verification, parent portals, etc. We support updated uniform laws and regulations that will increase platform safety. If we all care about customers, then let’s work together to get nationwide safety bills like this passed.

Critics are warning Kalshi and Polymarket that they could have a Juul-style reckoning. Lawmakers from both parties grilled witnesses from the sports betting and prediction market industries about consumer safety and advertising to minors.

if you look at volumes and earnings for sports betting apps like draftkings, they don’t seem materially affected by prediction markets but revenue multiples / valuations have compressed significantly actual usage metrics vs perception are divorced, wonder if/when that’ll shift

In 2021, Thomas Peterffy invited Tarek to his house and offered to buy Kalshi. At the time, Kalshi had practically no users, no volume, and zero name recognition. But Peterffy saw the vision. Tarek and Luana turned down a potential life-changing acquisition offer. They had deep respect for Peterffy, and the offer was serious money for what was a tiny startup. But the founders believed in Kalshi and were committed to giving it their all. As their trusted partner and supporter, I told them to follow their heart. Five years later, Kalshi and Interactive Brokers are business partners. These full-circle moments are truly special.

Why is it 93-1 if you bet $10 and 38-1 if you bet $1000 on something

"What's the dude's name on Snoopy? Linus? He got a blanket? I'm Linus and Jalen's my blanket. He helps me relax at a lot of different times throughout the course of games, but that's what great players do." - Mike Brown on Jalen Brunson

Kalshi raised $1B at a $22B valuation led by Coatue, with participation from Morgan Stanley, Sequoia, a16z, and others. In 2018, we were two kids who loved math, markets, and debate. And we had a dream: build the next generation financial market, where we capture a broader set of questions and harness the power of the masses to price them better than Wall Street. Kalshi was born to fulfill that dream. Today, most of these questions are traded indirectly, priced through imprecise proxies or negotiated bilaterally in opaque, restricted, relationship-driven markets. But thanks to our incredible community of users who make our markets work, Kalshi has the opportunity to change that by turning historically fragmented and untradeable risk into open, liquid, and standardized markets. We’ve seen this movie before. When interest rates, currencies, commodities, and crypto moved from dark to lit markets, volume did not just migrate: access expanded, new use cases emerged, and the opportunity grew by orders of magnitude. Today, Kalshi represents over 90% of US prediction market volume and the majority of activity globally, with annualized volume growing to $178B over the past 6 months. What started as retail is quickly becoming institutional — hedge funds, asset managers, prop firms, and insurers are beginning to trade, provide liquidity, and hedge real-world risk directly. The scope and scale of prediction markets are just beginning to take shape. We’re using this new capital to accelerate the institutional adoption underway — unlocking trillions in capital to facilitate active trading and risk management. Prediction markets are moving from early adoption to core financial infrastructure. This is just the beginning.

Kalshi raised $1B at a $22B valuation led by Coatue, with participation from Morgan Stanley, Sequoia, a16z, and others. In 2018, we were two kids who loved math, markets, and debate. And we had a dream: build the next generation financial market, where we capture a broader set of questions and harness the power of the masses to price them better than Wall Street. Kalshi was born to fulfill that dream. Today, most of these questions are traded indirectly, priced through imprecise proxies or negotiated bilaterally in opaque, restricted, relationship-driven markets. But thanks to our incredible community of users who make our markets work, Kalshi has the opportunity to change that by turning historically fragmented and untradeable risk into open, liquid, and standardized markets. We’ve seen this movie before. When interest rates, currencies, commodities, and crypto moved from dark to lit markets, volume did not just migrate: access expanded, new use cases emerged, and the opportunity grew by orders of magnitude. Today, Kalshi represents over 90% of US prediction market volume and the majority of activity globally, with annualized volume growing to $178B over the past 6 months. What started as retail is quickly becoming institutional — hedge funds, asset managers, prop firms, and insurers are beginning to trade, provide liquidity, and hedge real-world risk directly. The scope and scale of prediction markets are just beginning to take shape. We’re using this new capital to accelerate the institutional adoption underway — unlocking trillions in capital to facilitate active trading and risk management. Prediction markets are moving from early adoption to core financial infrastructure. This is just the beginning.