A high-stakes race for capital has redefined prediction markets. Calci’s $300 million raise at a $5 billion valuation makes Calci the most valuable CFTC-regulated event contract exchange in history. The company had expanded to 140 countries and a growing list of macro and cultural markets, and appeared to be solidifying its position as a global leader.
Around the same time, Calci’s on-chain rival Polymarket secured $2 billion in support from New York Stock Exchange owner Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) and announced plans to re-enter the U.S. market through a newly licensed exchange framework.
This marks the first true showdown between regulated infrastructure and crypto-native liquidity in prediction markets.
Polymarket is organized
The investment in ICE transformed Polymarket overnight from a shoddy decentralized platform to a strong competitor with Wall Street credentials. ICE’s commitment gives the company an implied valuation of $8 billion, making it the first blockchain-based prediction market backed by a Tier 1 financial operator. In addition to capital, the partnership grants Polymarket access to ICE’s global distribution and data feed infrastructure, providing a channel to reach thousands of institutions already active in the equity, commodity and derivatives markets.
The revival of polymarkets also comes with regulatory twists. After years of operating offshore, the company quietly built a U.S.-compliant pathway by acquiring QCX LLC, a CFTC-approved exchange. Polymarket obtained a designated contract market license through QCX and adopted a self-certification mechanism for the event market, allowing it to list new contracts without prior approval unless the CFTC objects. This structure effectively mirrors Carsi’s own legal model. The recent no-action letter clears the way for Polymarket to resume operations in the United States, starting with contracts related to sports outcomes and election odds.
In parallel, Polymarket has timed its re-entry to coincide with increased interest in political and sports betting ahead of the 2026 election cycle. The company’s first U.S. products reportedly include NFL-style moneyline and point spread markets, as well as macro-themed contracts on inflation, unemployment and presidential odds. For Kalsi, which has built its own regulated sports and entertainment categories, this means it directly aligns with nearly every growth area it has identified for 2025.
diverse philosophies
From its inception, Kalsi’s strategy was to look and operate more like a financial exchange than a crypto startup. The company operates under full CFTC oversight, clears trades in dollars, requires KYC verification, and positions its products as risk management tools rather than speculative bets. Founders Tarek Mansour and Luana López Lara often say their goal is to build a “futures exchange for everyday events,” a platform that allows traders to hedge against the risk of unexpected inflation, policy decisions, or even weather anomalies.
Polymarket’s trajectory could not have been more different. It emerged during the DeFi boom as an open tokenization platform that allows users to trade virtually any topic using stablecoins. Its speed and openness made it popular among crypto natives and political bettors, but regulatory exposure limited its access to mainstream capital. When U.S. regulators fined Polymarket and restricted its operations in 2022, it appeared to confirm Carsi’s long-held theory that compliance is the only way to scale. However, the partnership with ICE flipped that narrative and demonstrated that crypto-native models can coexist with regulatory legitimacy if trusted intermediaries bridge the gap.
The contrast between the two platforms is now about philosophy, not legality. Kalsi remains rooted in traditional market structures and values transparency and progressive growth. Polymarket is an experimental frontier, a decentralized core powered by institutional scaffolding. The result is convergence. Karshi is taking small steps towards innovation and Polymarket is taking steps towards regulation.
narrowing gap
Kalsi’s compliance advantage once seemed unassailable. But if Polymarket can operate under a similar CFTC framework while leveraging ICE’s technology and data reach, the margins between the two will begin to disappear. Investors and liquidity providers who once preferred the regulatory certainty of Calsi may now consider the same safety and greater upside with Polymarket, especially if ICE integrates predictive market data into existing financial terminals.
This development also creates new pressure for Kalsi to accelerate its roadmap. Its international expansion, initially aimed at gradually enrolling retailers and institutional users, now faces competition from rivals with larger valuations and much deeper distribution. It’s clear that Polymarket’s data could soon appear on Bloomberg-style dashboards and risk management systems, making it difficult for Calci to compete unless it secures a similar partnership.
The road ahead
Both companies now represent opposite ends of the same emerging industry. Kalsi represents the institutionalization of prediction markets and proves that prediction markets can exist within the confines of U.S. law. Once an outsider, Polymarket is now building a hybrid model that blends blockchain liquidity with regulated infrastructure. Competition between the two companies could accelerate the normalization of event-based trading as a legitimate component of financial portfolios, closing the gap between hedging instruments and public sentiment.
The challenge for Carsi is to prove that the regulations are a permanent moat, even if other regulations tighten them. The best defense may be to do it. Deeper liquidity, a broader product range, and continued trust from regulators wary of cryptocurrency experimentation. For Polymarket, the next step is to prove that institutional capital can flow through a decentralized system without losing trust or transparency.
Competition between the two will determine whether prediction markets evolve into a new class of financial derivatives or remain an experimental niche market. Kalsi’s founders have long argued that the world’s most valuable commodity is information about the future. The resurgence of the polymarket, backed by the owners of the New York Stock Exchange, suggests that Wall Street may have finally come to the same conclusion.
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