Key Takeaways
- Kalshi is reportedly seeking new funding at a $65B valuation before a potential future IPO.
- This valuation marks a significant jump from its $40B Series G round despite broader market uncertainty.
- Kalshi faces mounting state regulatory opposition over gambling laws, though the CFTC defends its jurisdiction.
Kalshi in Talks to Raise Capital at $65 Billion Valuation
Prediction market platforms have surged in both popularity and size, and investors are seeking to secure their positions before these giants go public.
Kalshi, one of the two largest prediction platforms, with trading volumes nearing $100 billion in October, is in talks to complete a new funding round even after having tapped private markets recently.
According to Bloomberg, which cites people familiar with the matter as sources, the company is talking with investors to raise funds at a $65 billion valuation in one of its last private rounds before going public. Nonetheless, Kalshi co-founder and CEO Tarek Mansour has not officially confirmed this, acknowledging only that there have been discussions for a possible initial public offering (IPO), but not in 2026.
The numbers floated are substantially higher than the $40 billion valuation the company reached in October after its $1 billion Series G funding round, led by Sequoia Capital and Wellington Management, with Baillie Gifford, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Coatue Management, and Andreessen Horowitz also participating.
At the time, Mansour stressed that the raised funds would enable the company to “get the resources and the capital to build all the things that are on our product roadmap that our customers, both retail and institutional, want us to build.”
Even amid recent financial uncertainty, as markets suffer after Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang resigned following an extramartial affair and an investigation that it was with a purported Chinese spy, investors appear convinced of the prediction market’s staying power as it rivals traditional betting platforms.
Nonetheless, the company faces increased opposition from state regulators, which argue that some or all of its event markets constitute gambling activities that need to be licensed under specific gambling laws. At the time of writing, at least 22 states contest Kalshi’s claims that their sports markets are swaps, with 38 Attorneys General stressing that prediction markets “cannot ignore states’ gambling laws.”
Nonetheless, the CFTC has backed Kalshi’s claims, with Chairman Michael S. Selig defending the agency’s exclusive federal oversight over these platforms.
“These products are commodity derivatives and squarely within the CFTC’s regulatory remit. As I’ve said before, the CFTC has the expertise and responsibility to defend its exclusive jurisdiction over commodity derivatives, and that’s exactly what we’ll do,” Selig said in February.
