When you think of betting, you typically think sports, elections, or maybe award show winners — not the resale price of a hot Pokémon card. But of course you can bet on that, too.
Kalshi means “everything” in Arabic and it’s also the name of a betting platform worth a reported $11B where you can bet on, well, everything: crypto prices, the weather, what topics public figures will mention in their next briefing or quarterly earnings report, etc.
How it works
Bettors buy futures contracts — agreements to buy or sell something at a later date — based on one of two (and in some cases more) outcomes. For example:
Kalshi constantly assesses the collective sentiment regarding a particular outcome. A 0% signifies no one thinks something will happen, while a 100% indicates everyone thinks it will. What contracts cost and what they’ll pay out varies as sentiment changes, and bettors can trade in or out at any time. (If you want a more detailed explanation with examples, here you go.)
Kalshi makes money by charging a transaction fee on the expected earnings of contracts. CEO Tarek Mansour said he expects predictions markets to eventually rival the stock exchanges, per Bloomberg.
Is this legal?
So far. The Commodity Future Trading Commission allows and regulates Kalshi, and the platform continues to operate in all 50 states, even though gambling regulators in some states that do not allow online sports gambling have sent it cease-and-desist letters.
Kalshi skirts the regulations by offering futures tied to sports events.
Now what about those Labubus?
Kalshi recently partnered with digital marketplace for collectibles Stock X to allow bets on hot ticket items, like sneakers, trading cards, and toys.
Bettors can speculate across three categories:
The collectible toy market alone is a $7B industry, per Business Insider, with Labubus — for reasons we still can’t quite explain — being a recent example of a product that’s gone absolutely wild.