Anthropic leads OpenAI with a 69% chance to IPO first on Polymarket
Other cryptocurrency sites are also launching similar products.
Earlier this month, TradeXYZ on Hyperliquid introduced pre-IPO futures for companies like Cerebras and SpaceX, giving traders another chance to bet on high-profile private companies before they go public.
Partnership focuses on data integrity and market resolution
Shayne Coplan, founder and CEO of Polymarket, stated that the launch provides access to a part of the financial markets that ordinary investors have long been barred from, allowing people to engage directly with the decisions that form the value of significant private companies for the first time.
In addition to giving institutional investors a fresh measure of market sentiment to complement the current transaction data used across the financial sector, it allows consumers to speculate on verified outcomes involving private businesses.
Polymarket has continued its rapid expansion, with new markets hitting record highs every month over the past year.
In 2026 so far, users in the United States have placed about $39 billion in wagers on the platform.
The agreement, according to Tom Callahan, CEO of Nasdaq Private Market, expands access to a broader set of market participants while reinforcing the company’s focus on accurate data to ensure fair and reliable market outcomes.
SpaceX IPO could dominate market
However, the launch coincides with a challenging period for businesses preparing to go public.
The performance of new stocks varied wildly last year.
On its first day, Navan fell 20% while Figma increased 250%. At year’s end, Gemini had dropped 65%, while Circle had increased 156%.
Wall Street analysts believe SpaceX’s IPO will dominate the market and outshine rival listings.
Samuel Kerr, who handles equity capital markets globally at Mergermarket, called the potential $75 billion SpaceX offering “otherworldly.”
It would considerably outperform recent IPOs such as Cerebras Systems, which was valued at almost $95 billion last week.
“There’s a possibility it could be a negative for the whole global IPO market,” Kerr told CNBC on Tuesday. The deal might “really suck all the oxygen out the room for anybody else. Everybody’s eyes are going to be on SpaceX.”
With so much money flowing into one stock, “almost nothing’s going to want to be in the market at the same time,” he added.
Salman Ahmed, the Global Head of Macro and Strategic Asset Allocation at Fidelity International, said that such large-scale listings could temporarily redirect capital away from the broader stock market.
“They’ll have to suck in a lot of capital from the system,” Ahmed said, “and that’s why I think there’s another reason we have to be careful about the winners right now, because that’s where the capital is going to be pulled from to finance these mega IPOs.”
Prediction markets processed more than $44 billion in wagers last year, but regulators say many of the top-performing participants are now automated trading bots rather than humans.
On Polymarket, automated bots now run more than 30% of active accounts. Data from the platform’s top earners shows that 14 of the top 20 accounts are controlled by bots.
More than 37% of these automated accounts consistently.
Lawmakers target insider trading risks
Polymarket trading activity fell 8.9% in April for the first time since August, as competitors gained market share.
According to Dune Analytics, the platform and its US operation registered $10.2 billion in bets in April, a decrease from $11.2 billion the previous month.
Meanwhile, rival platform Kalshi saw volume jump 13% to reach $14.8 billion in April.
The decrease occurred as Polymarket tried to rebuild its US footprint while under increased scrutiny from politicians concerned about insider trading.
Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in March, along with more than 40 other members of Congress.
They wanted laws that would ban government officials from profiting from secret material on these platforms.
“The CFTC maintains that event contracts are a type of swap subject to its jurisdiction, and, therefore, it should ensure that federal employees understand existing restrictions on prediction market insider trading,” the lawmakers said.
Several Polymarket users have drawn suspicion for placing winning bets on sensitive world events, including military actions in Venezuela and potential conflict with Iran.
CFTC Chairman Michael Selig told reporters that the agency utilizes AI tools to examine trade patterns, detect anomalous conduct, and collaborates with blockchain tracking businesses like Chainalysis to monitor offshore platforms such as Polymarket.
According to an AIMPACT update dated May 15, the CFTC uses AI to scan vast volumes of trading data, assisting staff in identifying suspect accounts and deciding whether to initiate investigations or issue subpoenas.
The business is combining blockchain analytics tools with market anomaly detection technologies to monitor both cryptocurrency and traditional financial markets.
The CFTC has received many allegations of odd trading and is actively looking into “hundreds to thousands” of potential cases. Future enforcement efforts are likely to broaden.
Selig stated that the agency will take action against U.S. users who attempt to mask their location by utilizing VPNs to access prohibited services.
That enforcement applies to worldwide marketplaces.
Even while platforms like Polymarket operate outside of the United States and lack U.S. licenses, the CFTC said it will seek enforcement against cross-border trades involving Americans and may utilize extraterritorial authority if necessary.
Platforms are reacting to the demand.
Polymarket and Kalshi have improved their checks for insider trading and market manipulation, bringing in external blockchain data providers to meet regulatory requirements.
The CFTC offered prediction market platforms some regulatory relief on Wednesday, issuing a no-action letter that exempts them from certain swap reporting requirements.
The exemption applies to exchanges and clearinghouses that handle event contracts.
Agency staff said they would not pursue enforcement against platforms that skip those reporting rules, following requests from companies seeking clarity on how event contracts should be regulated.
Although event contracts are officially classed as swaps since they have yes-or-no outcomes, the CFTC believes they work more like futures and options due to their uniform terms and exchange trading.
According to the new guidance, firms can report these transactions directly to the Commission in a manner similar to futures and options markets.
The relief now applies to 19 firms, including Polymarket US, Kalshi, Gemini Titan, and Bitnomial. Other companies listing event contracts may request coverage on the same terms.
Top prediction market platforms, including Kalshi and Polymarket, are rushing to offer highly leveraged crypto derivatives at the exact moment state and federal authorities are clashing in court over whether the industry’s core products constitute illegal betting or legitimate financial instruments.
Over the past year, these companies have gained national prominence by facilitating wagers on discrete, real-world occurrences, ranging from political races to macroeconomic data releases.
Now, by preparing to list perpetual futures, which are complex contracts that never expire and allow traders to multiply their market exposure using borrowed funds, these platforms are blurring the line between niche forecasting hubs and full-service digital asset exchanges.
Against this backdrop, this shift drastically expands their potential customer base, but it also amplifies the legal risks associated with the platforms.
Historically, platforms like Kalshi operated on a cyclical, event-driven basis, with traffic and trading volume spiking around major catalysts such as a presidential debate or a championship sporting event and then plummeting once the outcome was settled.
In this kind of market, a user purchased a binary “Yes” or “No” share, and the contract expired upon the event’s resolution.
Perpetual futures fundamentally alter that business model. Because these derivatives lack an expiration date, participants can maintain their market positions indefinitely, provided they meet ongoing margin requirements.
The instruments frequently allow users to leverage their bets up to 50 times their initial capital, attracting aggressive speculators seeking rapid returns from minute price fluctuations.
By rolling out these derivatives, Polymarket and Kalshi are abandoning their siloed event-contract operations to compete directly with centralized exchanges and retail brokerages. The underlying strategy for both platforms is to convert occasional political bettors into daily, high-frequency traders.
While Kalshi has explicitly stated its intention to enter the perpetuals arena, Polymarket’s exact roadmap remains guarded, including which specific assets it will cover and whether it will restrict access for US customers.
Why prediction markets are moving into perpetual futures
Why perps, why now?
The motivation to embrace this new feature comes down to basic market structure.
Traditional crypto spot trading, which is the simple buying and holding of digital assets, has decelerated from the frenzied peaks of previous market cycles, logging $18.6 trillion in volume last year.
Meanwhile, perpetual futures generated more than three times that amount. Data from CryptoQuant show that the global trading volume for crypto perpetual futures hit $61.7 trillion last year.
That volume disparity dictates corporate strategy. Platforms recognize that to maintain engagement during periods of low volatility, they must offer instruments that allow users to short the market, hedge portfolios, and employ leverage.
While prediction markets currently command significant capital, with all-time notional volume surpassing $150 billion, the episodic nature of event contracts cannot match the continuous, around-the-clock fee generation of a highly active derivatives order book.
Moreover, the broader financial technology sector is experiencing a rapid collapse of operational boundaries, with centralized platforms like Robinhood, Coinbase, and Gemini all embracing event-based offerings.
Mo Shaikh, co-founder of the Aptos blockchain network, noted that financial applications have historically trended toward consolidation, citing the expansions of legacy platforms like PayPal. However, he warned that forcing disparate user bases into a single application rarely succeeds seamlessly.
“The trader, the bettor, the long-term investor, the payments user, they show up for different reasons,” Shaikh said, adding that true value lies in controlling the underlying infrastructure. “Clearing, liquidity, identity, settlement, data, those layers can unify even if the frontends remain fragmented.”
Meanwhile, the shift among prediction market players is partially defensive.
Offshore decentralized exchange Hyperliquid, a dominant force in perpetual futures, recently encroached on the prediction sector by revealing plans to list its own event contracts.
As a result, the market is split on who holds the strategic advantage in the ensuing turf war.
Jiani Chen, a growth officer with the Solana Foundation, noted the technical disparities, arguing that decentralized derivatives exchanges have a much easier time adding prediction markets to their backend than prediction platforms do spinning up complex futures trading engines.
However, Kyle Samani, chairman of Forward Industries, dismissed the technical hurdles, arguing that customer acquisition is the true bottleneck for digital asset platforms. He said:
“It’s way harder to bootstrap liquidity and acquire normie users for prediction markets. Kalshi perps are going to crush.”
The legal fight is still about who gets to call it gambling
Legal battle over prediction markets
The aggressive product expansion coincides with an existential legal threat as state regulators are launching coordinated efforts to classify the prediction platforms as unlicensed casinos, rejecting the premise that event contracts are sophisticated financial tools.
On April 21, New York Attorney General Letitia James filed sweeping lawsuits against digital asset firms Coinbase and Gemini, demanding $3.4 billion in combined penalties and restitution.
James alleged the companies bypass state taxes and consumer protection laws by offering prediction markets to retail users, including minors.
State officials pointed to research by the National Institutes of Health linking early exposure to mobile betting with heightened risks of anxiety and financial distress, while noting American Psychological Association data showing severe mental health risks associated with gambling disorders.
James said:
“Gambling by another name is still gambling, and it is not exempt from regulation under our state laws and Constitution.”
The industry firmly rejects the gambling label, countering that the contracts are vital instruments for hedging geopolitical and economic risks.
The judiciary is already untangling the overlapping claims. A federal appeals court in Philadelphia ruled against New Jersey gaming regulators earlier this year, determining the CFTC held sole regulatory authority over Kalshi’s election and sports-related contracts.
This sequence of litigation reflects a deeply fractured regulatory perimeter that companies must navigate as they deploy new derivative products.
A bigger market, and a bigger regulatory target
The move into perpetual futures would further position prediction markets as part of mainstream financial infrastructure rather than a niche corner of online speculation.
That shift is already drawing attention from traditional finance. The Intercontinental Exchange, parent of the New York Stock Exchange, recently invested $2 billion in Polymarket, a sign that major market operators see commercial value in platforms built around event-driven pricing.
Supporters of the model argue that prediction markets are proving useful as both forecasting tools and trading venues.
In high-liquidity markets, Brier scores, a standard measure of probabilistic accuracy, have fallen as low as 0.0247 shortly before resolution, suggesting pricing errors narrow sharply as capital and participation deepen. Industry estimates also show that about 10% of proprietary trading firms are already active in event contracts, using them in part to hedge macro and policy risk.
That combination of data value and trading activity helps explain why platforms are racing to broaden their product mix.
Rob Hadick, managing partner at Dragonfly, framed the commercial logic bluntly:
“Owning your customer will be the only way to have longevity in this new world of broad financialization.”
However, not everyone sees perpetual futures as the natural next step.
Alex Momot, chief executive and co-founder of Peanut Trade, told CryptoSlate that the current push looks more like a response to tightening legal pressure than a durable product strategy.
He noted that regulators and some jurisdictions are moving against prediction markets, and as a result, these operators appear to be shifting closer to the crypto-exchange model, where the rules are clearer, and the risk of being classified as gambling is lower.
Momot argued that strategy may offer only limited relief. In his view, the deeper problem is liquidity. Without more depth, many of the sector’s most promising use cases, including hedging and insurance against real-world event risk, remain too small to scale.
He said the stronger long-term path may lie in index-style products, market aggregation, and pooled liquidity across events, structures that could make prediction markets look more like traditional derivatives or synthetic exposures.
That viewpoint points to a broader tension now shaping the industry. One camp sees perpetual futures as the fastest way to capture more trading volume and keep users active between headline-driven events. Another sees them as a tactical detour from the harder task of building deeper, more resilient liquidity.
Either way, the legal risk is rising. Dyma Budorin, founder and chief executive of CORE3, said the merging of prediction and derivatives markets is likely to draw closer scrutiny from regulators already struggling to define the sector.
He said:
“What we’re really seeing is a convergence toward perp-like behavior without the corresponding risk controls. If this trend continues, regulators won’t treat prediction markets as harmless forecasting tools, they’ll treat them as derivatives platforms operating outside the rules. And historically, that doesn’t end quietly.”
The New York litigation has already ensured that the fight over jurisdiction will remain central to the industry’s future. That battle could eventually reach the U.S. Supreme Court or force Congress to step in with a clearer statutory framework.
Until then, prediction-market operators appear willing to keep expanding through the uncertainty, betting that the commercial upside of perpetual futures is worth the legal exposure.
The numbers are in, and they are not pretty for everyday traders who bet on prediction markets.
Despite handling tens of billions of dollars in trades, these platforms appear to be leaving the overwhelming majority of users worse off financially.
Prediction markets have grown fast. By 2025, platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi were processing $28 billion in trading volume.
The idea behind them is simple: people bet on future events, and the odds that form are supposed to reflect what the public genuinely believes will happen.
Arizona Democrat Yassamin Ansari recently targeted both Polymarket and Kalshi, calling them “casinos where the rich and powerful are the house and everyone else is the chips.”
She posted on X that 99.96% of users lose everything while the top 0.04% walk away with billions.
Ansari slams the prediction market as a rigged casino Source: @RepYassAnsari
Her claim comes from a December 2025 on-chain analysis by a blockchain researcher known as DeFi Oasis.
That study found that less than 0.04% of Polymarket wallet addresses captured more than 70% of all realized profits, totaling $3.7 billion.
Analysts, however, pointed out that Ansari’s wording mixes up two separate figures. The 0.04% refers to who captured most of the winnings, not simply who won anything at all.
Ansari is co-sponsoring a bill called the BETS OFF Act alongside Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Reps. Greg Casar and Rashida Tlaib of Texas and Michigan, respectively. The bill would ban betting on events like war, terrorism, assassination, and government decisions.
Whatever the exact interpretation of the 0.04% figure, more recent data puts the problem in sharper focus.
The sharp drop, according to Sergeenkov, is tied to a flood of new and inexperienced users drawn in by the buzz around the November 2024 U.S. presidential election. “Less experienced users tend to trade less successfully,” he noted.
The 84.1% figure is also higher than what a 2025 study from researchers Felix Reichenbach and Martin Walther found.
Their paper put the losing share at around 70%. The difference, Sergeenkov explains, comes down to how the math is done.
His method accounts for wallet splits and merges, which earlier analyses left out. “When splits are left out, an address looks more profitable because one category of expenses is simply invisible,” he said.
The numbers behind the losses
A deeper look at the data shows just how rare meaningful earnings are on these platforms. Of 2.5 million wallets studied, only 2% had ever made more than $1,000 in total. Just 0.32% had cleared $10,000, and only 840 wallets, that is 0.033%, had earned more than $100,000.
The average trade on Polymarket is $89, and 80% of traders never place a bet larger than $500 on average.
The idea of replacing a regular paycheck through trading appears almost out of reach. The average monthly salary in the United States is roughly $5,000. Only 0.98% of traders ever hit that mark in a single month.
The number who managed it for 12 months straight: just 35 out of 2.5 million people.
The findings carry weight at a time when major financial institutions have moved in.
The Intercontinental Exchange, which owns the New York Stock Exchange, completed a $2 billion deal with Polymarket in March. Kalshi recently raised $1 billion, pushing its valuation to $22 billion.
The BETS OFF Act and a separate bill called the Death Bets Act, introduced by Rep. Mike Levin, are not widely expected to pass in the current Congress. Still, observers say the push for stronger protections for everyday users is not going away.
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament, posted a striking piece of market commentary on X before the latest futures swing. Adding fuel to the online propaganda proxy war being fought on social media, the comments lean into accusations of insider trading on Polymarket war bets.
“Pre-market so-called ‘news’ or ‘Truth’ is often just a setup for profit-taking,” he wrote. “If they pump it, short it. If they dump it, go long.”
The market then traded almost exactly as described.
The Kobeissi Letter tracked the move in time order, with S&P 500 futures opening sharply lower on Sunday evening, recovering by late evening, then extending higher after President Trump said on Truth Social that “great progress” had been made on Iran peace talks.
Annotated 30-minute S&P 500 E-mini futures chart showing a sharp overnight rebound after headlines about Trump’s comments on Iran peace talks, with markers highlighting key time-stamped moves from the futures open to the morning recovery.
MarketWatch confirmed the validity of the account that had so publicly offered contrarian trading advice to U.S. investors shortly before the Sunday futures open, and Barron’s described Monday’s rebound as another early-morning market jolt driven by Trump’s social-media messaging on Iran.
Trump’s posts around Iran have repeatedly altered short-term pricing across equities, oil, and crypto.
Bloomberg reported that billions of dollars in oil and stock-index futures changed hands shortly before one of Trump’s Iran posts sent crude lower and equities higher, while The Wall Street Journal described a burst of futures activity ahead of another Trump message that drew scrutiny across trading desks.
The economic climate for the week ahead sits inside that backdrop.
The market faces a geopolitical risk premium in oil, a rising probability of slower growth, and a political communications channel that now functions as an immediate pricing input.
Monday’s cross-asset move makes the interaction plain.
S&P 500 futures added to gains after Trump said the U.S. was in “serious discussions” with a “new, and more reasonable regime” in Iran.
The same message cycle has also included a threat to “completely obliterate” Iran’s energy and water infrastructure if a settlement failed to materialize.
That combination, conciliatory language on one side and escalation risk on the other, shaped the session. The Wall Street Journal reported WTI above $100 a barrel and Brent above $108, while Brent then surged above $116 as the conflict intensified.
Investors are now dealing with diplomacy and disruption at the same time, and the energy channel remains the main route into inflation, rates, and growth.
Bitcoin enters this equation with one structural advantage over every major U.S. risk asset.
It trades through all of it, through weekends, through Asia hours, through the periods when Wall Street’s core cash market is closed.
Bitcoin tracked the same macro shock as equities, then formed its own pattern while Wall Street was offline
Bitcoin’s value in this sequence comes from timing.
It trades continuously, so it acts as a live macro market when U.S. equities are closed.
That gives it two roles at once.
It responds to the same geopolitical inputs that move the S&P 500, and it also offers a real-time view of how those inputs are being absorbed outside the U.S. cash session.
The pattern in the charts around this latest Iran-Trump sequence clearly carries that distinction.
Bitcoin sold off hard into the weekend and into the period around the U.S. close, then moved into a long stabilization band while U.S. equities sat offline.
Bitcoin price fell to the March 27 close, then spent much of the closeout period in a broad range around the mid- to upper $66,000s, before firming into the U.S. open on Monday.
The S&P’s intraday sequence was sharper and more discrete.
Bitcoin’s sequence was earlier, more continuous, and more gradual.
That broad structure lines up with broader market reporting from earlier in the month.
Bitcoin was the first liquid asset to price the Iran war when the initial attack cycle began on a Saturday, dropping 8.5% while traditional markets were closed.
In the days that followed, Bitcoin slid as far as $67,300 before turning higher after Trump said the U.S. had begun talks with Iran. Bitcoin then climbed back above $71,000 when war concerns eased.
Bitcoin also slid below $68,500 last week as another round of mixed messaging from Iran whipsawed markets. There’s a simple interpretation.
Bitcoin has been trading as a macro-sensitive asset throughout this conflict, with oil, rates, and political signals shaping direction.
The latest charts add a more refined point.
Three market charts showing Bitcoin, the U.S. Dollar Index, and the 10-year Treasury yield around the U.S. market open.
Bitcoin mirrored the S&P at the regime level, with both assets weakening under geopolitical stress and firming when Trump’s rhetoric shifted toward talks. Within that regime, the path diverged.
During the hours when the S&P cash market was closed, Bitcoin spent more time absorbing losses and building a base than extending a strong relief move.
The visible lift came closer to the U.S. open.
That timing suggests Bitcoin functioned as a pre-open sentiment gauge for the Monday rebound in equities, with the strongest upside leg appearing from around 00:01 UTC on Monday into the U.S. session.
The U.S. Dollar Index has also climbed steadily into Monday, which gives the move extra texture.
A firmer dollar usually tightens the backdrop for BTC and other risk assets.
Bitcoin’s ability to stabilize and then rise alongside a rising DXY points to a move driven by repricing around Iran and Trump’s messaging, supported by positioning and relief, with less help from the currency side of the macro equation.
Oil, payrolls, retail sales, and Bitcoin’s 24/7 signal define the week ahead
The macro calendar now arrives with crude oil at the center.
The Wall Street Journal said WTI had climbed roughly 50% since the U.S. and Israel began bombing Iran in late February.
Axios wrote that the OECD now sees U.S. inflation reaching 4.2% in 2026, up 1.2 percentage points from expectations in December, because the war and the energy shock have altered the inflation path.
That turns this week’s economic releases into a concentrated stress test.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics says the March Employment Situation arrives Friday, April 3, at 8:30 a.m. ET.
The Census Bureau says the delayed February advance retail sales release lands on April 1.
The Institute for Supply Management says the March Manufacturing PMI will be released at 10:00 a.m. ET on Wednesday, April 1.
Each of those reports now carries a second layer. Investors will judge growth through the lens of oil. That raises the pressure on every risk asset, including bitcoin.
Bitcoin has already outperformed many major assets at points during the stress.
The immediate week-ahead setup is narrower and more practical.
Bitcoin is serving as a high-beta macro instrument during geopolitical repricing, and it is also serving as a 24/7 discovery venue for sentiment shifts that hit outside U.S. cash hours.
That combination makes Bitcoin unusually useful right now.
If Trump posts over a weekend, bitcoin trades first.
If oil surges in Asia hours, bitcoin absorbs that input before New York.
If a diplomatic turn emerges in the early morning, bitcoin can begin revaluing risk before the S&P cash market gets a vote.
The unresolved question for the week sits exactly here.
Trump’s Iran posts have shown enough market impact to count as a working transmission channel, and traders have been watching these moments closely, including bursts of trading activity that arrived shortly before some of the posts.
Markets still need confirmation from events on the ground, from oil, and from the incoming U.S. data.
Bitcoin offers one of the clearest real-time views of how investors are processing that uncertainty.
The recent pattern suggests a sequence with three phases, initial risk repricing, stabilization through the closure, then a firmer advance into the U.S. reopen.
If that sequence repeats during the next round of Iran-related messaging, bitcoin’s weekend and overnight behavior will offer one of the earliest clues about whether traders see another temporary relief move forming, or whether the energy shock is taking control of the week.
Prediction Markets Now Accessible On-the-Go for Retail and Institutional Users
WalletV, the Web3 mobile wallet incubated by Virgo Group, has launched direct integration with Polymarket, the leading decentralized prediction market platform. This expansion marks a significant milestone in WalletV’s vision to consolidate all major DeFi verticals into a single, seamless mobile experience. Users can now predict, trade, and profit from real-world outcomes—including politics, economics, sports, and emerging market events—directly within the WalletV interface, without navigating between multiple applications. WalletV operates across multiple blockchains including Bitcoin, Solana, Ethereum, Base, Arbitrum, Polygon, Avalanche, and more, ensuring users have maximum flexibility and access.
This integration comes after months of product development to revolutionize decentralized finance. In July 2025, WalletV brought Hyperliquid perpetuals trading (170+ markets, up to 40x leverage) to users for a smoother, faster experience. The platform then launched its Launchpad, which powers projects across HyperEVM, BSC, XLayer, and Base—giving creators and traders new frontiers to explore directly within the app. Today’s Polymarket integration builds on this momentum, complementing perpetual futures with real-time prediction market insights and enabling users to access one of the fastest-growing DeFi projects without switching platforms.
WalletV now offers a comprehensive DeFi platform with perpetual futures trading, prediction markets, cross-chain bridging, Smart Money tracking, MemeScan for emerging tokens, and a VPoints rewards program—all accessible from a single mobile interface. Key benefits include direct access to Polymarket without switching platforms, use of market probabilities to sharpen trading strategies with on-chain data, and participation in a permissionless, transparent ecosystem without intermediaries. WalletV is running promotional incentives including a $10 loss refund for the first 1,000 Polymarket users, plus a VPoints program where every action—swaps, perpetual trades, and referrals—earns rewards. Users can also invite friends and earn 20% commission from their perpetual trading activity.
“Prediction markets are becoming essential infrastructure for how society forecasts and understands real-world outcomes,” said Adam Cai, CEO of Virgo Group. “By integrating Polymarket directly into WalletV, we’re democratizing access to institutional-grade prediction markets and perpetual futures trading. This is a critical milestone in our mission to position Virgo as the leading integrated platform for retail and institutional traders globally.”
About WalletV
WalletV is a non-custodial Web3 wallet providing seamless access to prediction markets, perpetual futures, and multichain DeFi. Available on iOS and Android, WalletV supports Bitcoin, Solana, Ethereum, Base, BNB Chain, Arbitrum, Polygon, Avalanche, and more. The platform features Hyperliquid perpetuals trading (170+ markets, up to 40x leverage), Polymarket prediction markets, Smart Money tracking, MemeScan for emerging tokens, and a VPoints rewards program. Built by Virgo Group, WalletV is designed for both retail traders and institutions seeking efficient, transparent access to multiple DeFi verticals from a single mobile interface.
About Polymarket
Polymarket is the leading decentralized prediction market platform, enabling users to trade on real-world outcomes across politics, economics, sports, and emerging events. With billions in trading volume, Polymarket has become the gold standard for transparent, on-chain prediction markets, offering users the ability to hedge risk, speculate, and profit from their market insights. The platform operates with full transparency, allowing users to view all market activity and liquidity on-chain.
About Virgo Group
Virgo Group is a comprehensive digital asset services provider operating across three continents. The company’s offerings include non-custodial trading platforms (VirgoCX and VirgoAU), institutional OTC trading desks (Virgo Wealth), digital asset management services, and VirgoPAY, a stablecoin settlement and money remittance platform. WalletV, incubated by Virgo, serves as the gateway for all Web3 users to a complete DeFi experience, combining retail accessibility with institutional-grade infrastructure and compliance standards.
For more information about WalletV and the Polymarket integration, visit walletv.io
Google has announced a significant partnership with prediction market platforms Polymarket and Kalshi, bringing real-time odds data directly into Google Search and Google Finance. The integration will allow users to query event probabilities—from Federal Reserve rate decisions to economic forecasts—without leaving their search results, marking a major step toward mainstream adoption of prediction markets as financial tools.
How the Integration Works
Users will soon be able to search questions like “What will GDP growth be for 2025?” and receive current market probabilities alongside traditional financial data. Google Finance will surface prediction market data from both Polymarket and Kalshi, showing not only current odds but also how those probabilities have shifted over time.
The rollout begins in the coming weeks through Google Labs, where early testers can access the feature before a broader public release. Google product leader Rose Yao unveiled the integration as part of a larger Google Finance upgrade that includes expanded Deep Search capabilities, corporate earnings tracking, and expansion into India.
Prediction markets data from Polymarket and Kalshi means you can ask questions about future events to see current probabilities in the market and how they’ve changed over time.
— Rose Yao, Google Product Leader
The terminology matters slightly here: while Google refers to the addition as “prediction markets data,” both Polymarket and Kalshi have used the term “odds” to describe what users will see. The distinction reflects how these platforms market themselves to different audiences.
Key Detail
The integration launches first through Google Labs for early access, with full rollout to follow in subsequent weeks.
What This Means for Prediction Markets
The Google partnership represents a watershed moment for an industry that has operated in regulatory gray zones across multiple jurisdictions. Prediction markets have existed for years, but they have largely remained niche products used by sophisticated traders and political junkies. This integration brings them to mainstream visibility overnight.
Polymarket and Kalshi currently operate within different legal frameworks. Kalshi, which is registered with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), has built its volume primarily around sports betting contracts. Polymarket operates in a more complicated regulatory environment, with its parent company facing ongoing scrutiny from U.S. authorities.
Despite these regulatory challenges, both platforms have built substantial trading communities. The Google endorsement signals that major technology platforms now view prediction markets as legitimate financial data sources worthy of prominent placement.
This is big news and represents the kind of mainstream exposure that moves prediction markets closer to broader legitimization.
— Tarek Mansour, Kalshi CEO
Industry observers believe this partnership could catalyze broader adoption. When tens of millions of Google users encounter prediction market data while researching economic questions or market trends, it normalizes the concept of probabilistic forecasting as a financial tool.
Market Implications
Beyond Sports Betting
Kalshi’s current trading volume derives heavily from sports event contracts, which remain the easiest category for regulators to understand and, in some cases, approve. However, prediction markets encompass far broader applications: political outcomes, economic indicators, scientific breakthroughs, and corporate performance metrics.
The Google integration explicitly highlights non-sports use cases. By featuring economic forecasting as the primary example, Google is positioning prediction markets as serious financial tools rather than betting platforms. This distinction could prove important for regulatory discussions moving forward.
Many market participants and observers, including figures at Google, recognize that prediction markets aggregate dispersed knowledge in ways traditional financial models sometimes miss. When thousands of informed traders collectively price a probability, that market signal often contains valuable information about real-world outcomes.
For cryptocurrency markets more broadly, this represents validation that blockchain-based financial products can earn acceptance from mainstream technology companies. Polymarket runs on blockchain infrastructure, making this integration a win for crypto adoption narratives.
Context
Prediction markets have existed for decades, but blockchain-based versions like Polymarket have dramatically lowered barriers to entry and expanded trading hours, contributing to their recent growth.
Regulatory Landscape Ahead
The timing of this announcement arrives as prediction markets face mounting regulatory pressure in the United States. Several states have challenged the legality of certain prediction market activities, citing sports betting prohibitions and gaming regulations.
A Google partnership does not resolve these legal questions, but it does shift the conversation. When a company of Google’s stature integrates prediction market data into its core products, it becomes harder for regulators to dismiss the category as illegitimate or fringe.
Kalshi operates under CFTC approval for certain contract types, providing one regulatory pathway. Polymarket has pursued different strategies, though its regulatory status remains contested. This partnership may ultimately influence how policymakers approach oversight of prediction markets across different jurisdictions.
The integration also underscores why prediction markets matter to financial infrastructure. As monetary policy, inflation, and economic growth remain central concerns for investors and consumers alike, tools that aggregate market expectations become increasingly valuable.
The Broader Market Context
Prediction markets have grown substantially over the past five years, with trading volumes reaching billions of dollars annually across major platforms. This expansion reflects increased institutional and retail interest in probabilistic forecasting as markets become more uncertain and traditional forecasting methods face criticism.
Financial institutions increasingly use prediction market data as one input among many for decision-making. Asset managers, hedge funds, and corporate strategy teams monitor prediction market movements alongside traditional indicators like equity futures and bond yields. The Google integration accelerates this trend by making such data instantly accessible to mainstream investors.
Polymarket, founded in 2020, has grown to handle over $2 billion in trading volume across thousands of active markets. Kalshi, launched in 2021, has similarly expanded its user base and trading activity. Both platforms have benefited from cryptocurrency’s infrastructure innovations, particularly blockchain technology that enables borderless, 24/7 trading without traditional financial intermediaries.
The economics of prediction markets create powerful incentives for accuracy. Unlike opinion polls or expert forecasts, market participants put real capital at risk when they make predictions. This skin-in-the-game dynamic often produces more reliable forecasts than surveys or analyst reports, a phenomenon that academic research has repeatedly documented.
Entity Background and Strategic Positioning
Google’s foray into prediction market data integration reflects the company’s broader strategy to become the primary information destination for all types of financial queries. The company has steadily expanded Google Finance capabilities over the past decade, competing with Bloomberg, Yahoo Finance, and specialized investment platforms.
By adding prediction market data, Google distinguishes itself from competitors by offering forward-looking probabilistic information alongside historical price data. This positions Google Finance as a comprehensive platform covering not just what markets have done, but what they expect to happen.
Polymarket and Kalshi represent different approaches to the same opportunity. Kalshi’s CFTC registration provides regulatory certainty in the United States, though it limits certain contract types. Polymarket’s blockchain-native approach offers global accessibility and faster innovation cycles, despite greater regulatory uncertainty. Google’s partnership with both platforms hedges these bets and demonstrates the company’s willingness to work within multiple regulatory frameworks simultaneously.
For Google, the partnership carries strategic value beyond financial data provision. It signals the company’s commitment to decentralized finance infrastructure and blockchain-based systems at a time when regulators remain skeptical of crypto innovations. By treating Polymarket data with the same legitimacy as traditional market data, Google implicitly endorses blockchain financial products.
Conclusion: A Turning Point for Prediction Markets
The Google partnership with Polymarket and Kalshi represents more than a simple data integration—it marks the moment when prediction markets transition from specialized trading venues to mainstream financial infrastructure. This shift carries profound implications for how markets function, how information flows, and ultimately, how societies forecast and plan for the future.
With millions of Google users now able to instantly access prediction market probabilities for major economic and political questions, these platforms move decisively into the mainstream. The regulatory challenges facing prediction markets remain significant, but the visibility and legitimacy conferred by Google’s endorsement creates momentum toward broader acceptance and formalization.
For investors, the integration offers immediate practical value through better access to market expectations. For policymakers, it presents both opportunity and challenge—these markets can improve forecasting and policy decisions, but require thoughtful regulatory frameworks to prevent manipulation and protect participants. For the broader fintech ecosystem, it validates the model of decentralized, blockchain-based financial services gaining acceptance through mainstream adoption.
As this integration rolls out globally, expect prediction market volume and sophistication to increase substantially. The next phase of growth will likely involve institutional investors building formal prediction market trading operations, corporate treasury teams using markets to hedge uncertainty, and policymakers incorporating prediction market signals into official forecasting processes. Google’s decision to feature this data prominently signals that future is now arriving.
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Polymarket, the crypto-powered prediction market, is considering entering the stablecoin market with two options on the table. The first one is to introduce its own customized stablecoin, or accept a revenue-sharing deal with Circle based on the amount of USDC held on the platform.
According to reports, Polymarket’s main drive for launching its stablecoin is to earn yield from the reserves that currently benefit Circle. By issuing a native token, the platform could keep that revenue in-house.
Polymarket considering its own stablecoin.
Stablecoin entry could enhance liquidity in prediction markets, providing native economic incentives.
If executed well, this move could expand Polymarket’s ecosystem and increase retention by creating new DeFi opportunities. pic.twitter.com/qheRiixv0Q
Stablecoins have become the main beneficiaries of Polymarket’s rising activity. All transactions on the platform settle in USDC on the Polygon network. This ensures a steady transaction flow and sustained demand for the token.
A deal with Circle or customize its stablecoin?
Legislation around stablecoins passed in the US last week makes issuing a stablecoin an attractive business proposition for crypto native firms and more traditional finance players alike.
To that end, launching a stablecoin is hard for many companies. For instance, Circle, the company that created USDC, is known to be ending revenue-sharing deals with exchanges, payment companies, and other fintechs. The reason behind this is to stay competitive in a field that is changing so quickly.
A Polymarket representative said no decision has yet been made on the stablecoin question. However, of the two options, for Polymarket, issuing its own stablecoin is a much easier lift from a regulatory standpoint.
According to a person familiar with the matter, “In the case of Polymarket, it’s a closed ecosystem and all they really need to do is to be able to exchange USDC or USDT into whatever their custom stablecoin is. They don’t have to worry about the last mile on ramp and off ramp. That’s a very simple thing to build, and easy to secure and control.”
In addition, Polymarket has grown in popularity. According to SimilarWeb, over $8 billion in bets were placed during last year’s US election cycle, and the site saw nearly 16 million visits in May. Also, Polymarket announced plans to overhaul its reward and oracle-resolution system.
The new framework, part of its 2028 Election Holding Rewards program, will offer more accurate pricing and easier migration for users.
Meanwhile, Polymarket wants to buy QCEX, a CFTC-licensed exchange and clearinghouse, in a $112 million deal that clears the path for regulated operations in the world’s largest financial market. It is based in the US. This follows the closure of civil and criminal investigations into its allowing US-based customers to place bets on its platform.
Polymarket has handled more than $14 billion in trades since its launch. It had more than $1 billion in monthly volume in May alone, with 20,000 to 30,000 active daily traders. After Trump’s re-election in November 2024, the platform moved $2.5 billion in a single month, making it one of its busiest times.
During that surge, there were a lot of USDC transfers and more action on the bridges to move money around.
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