The financial services company looks to take on Polymarket in the sports betting arena ahead of the NFL and NCAA football seasons.
Fintech giant Robinhood is expanding its prediction market offerings through a new partnership with Kalshi to offer NFL and NCAA football prediction markets on its app.
Users will be able to speculate on the outcomes of the United States’ most popular sport, and the feature “will be available to all eligible customers in the coming days.”
Robinhood’s plans to offer initial contracts for the first two weeks of the professional and collegiate seasons, and will continue to add weekly matches over time. The trading platform revealed its first prediction markets, known as “event contracts,” in March.
With the launch, Robinhood is challenging not only Polymarket as a competing prediction market, but legacy sports betting platforms such as FanDuel and DraftKings. Unlike traditional betting platforms, prediction market contracts have the market set the prices and outcome odds, whereas legacy apps rely on professional bookmakers and prediction models.
“Football is far and away the most popular sport in America,” said JB Mackenzie, VP & GM of Futures and International at Robinhood. “Adding pro and college football to our prediction markets hub is a no-brainer for us as we aim to make Robinhood a one-stop shop for all your investing and trading needs.”
Kalshi, which is based in the United States, recently announced support for SOL deposits on its platform in addition to existing options such as BTC, USDC, and XRP.
While the platform supports crypto deposits, crypto-natives tend to prefer Polymarket due to factors such as market liquidity, and Kalshi’s controversial tactics, which were allegedly used to slander Polymarket when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan’s home.
Prediction markets have been exploding over the last two years, led by Polymarket’s resurgence during the 2024 U.S. presidential election. Polymarket achieved an all-time high monthly trading volume of $2.5 billion in October leading up to the election, after averaging between $5-$10 million in monthly volume throughout 2023.
Activity on the marketplace has slowed since, but it is still processing roughly $1 billion in volume per month, a substantial increase from its pre-election metrics.
Source: https://thedefiant.io/news/tradfi-and-fintech/robinhood-partners-with-kalshi-to-launch-football-prediction-markets
