Kalshi will start taking deposits in USD Coin (USDC), a popular stablecoin, as the prediction marketplace vies for users ahead of the United States’ November elections, the platform confirmed on Oct. 28.
Cryptocurrency deposits will be live imminently, with offramping managed by ZeroHash, a crypto payments platform, according to a report by Fortune magazine.
Competition is heating up among political betting platforms, with Web3 platform Polymarket decisively in the lead and rivals, including Kalshi, scrambling to catch up.
Source: Kalshi
Related: Kalshi adds global elections to betting platform
On Oct. 7, Kalshi listed event contracts for betting on US election outcomes after prevailing in a landmark court battle in September.
This marked the first time an election prediction market has been permitted to operate in the US. It paves the way for others to enter the fray, including Web3 platforms such as Polymarket.
On Oct. 28, cryptocurrency and stock trading platform Robinhood announced it had introduced contracts for certain users to bet on the outcome of the presidential election between Vice President Kamala Harris and Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Meanwhile, some $2.6 billion rides on the outcome of the November presidential election on Polymarket as of Oct. 23, according to its website.
As of Oct. 23, Kalshi’s flagship market — “Who will win the Presidential election?” — has bootstrapped nearly $87 million in total betting volume since listing on Oct. 7, according to Kalshi’s website.
US regulators said election prediction markets such as Kalshi threaten the integrity of elections, but industry analysts say they often capture public sentiment more accurately than polls.
Three in four crypto owners said a candidate’s crypto policy will impact how they vote. Source: Gemini
Former President Trump is favored to win the presidency by a significant margin on Polymarket and Kalshi. The platforms peg Trump’s odds at 62% and 66%, respectively, according to both websites as of Oct. 28.
The November election pits Trump — who has said he wants to make America “the crypto capital of the world” — against Harris, who has been comparatively quiet on the industry.
Bitcoin’s (BTC) performance is creating a “very bullish setup” for the digital asset as investors brace for the election, Matthew Sigel, VanEck’s head of digital assets research, told CNBC on Oct. 28.
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