Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, has struck a landmark deal to invest up to $2bn in prediction market platform Polymarket, valuing the firm at around $8bn pre-investment.
The agreement will see ICE become the global distributor of Polymarket’s event-driven data, offering institutional and retail customers sentiment insights across politics, markets, sport and culture.
Both companies will also collaborate on what they called “tokenization initiatives”.
Polymarket founder and CEO Shayne Coplan said: “Our partnership with ICE marks a major step in bringing prediction markets into the financial mainstream.
“Together, we’re expanding how individuals and institutions use probabilities to understand and price the future… By combining ICE’s institutional scale and credibility with Polymarket’s consumer savvy, we will be able to deliver world-class products for the modern investor.
“Realising the potential of new technologies, such as tokenization, will require collaboration between established market leaders and next-generation innovators.”
The partnership comes days after Polymarket re-entered the US market following the settlement with the Commodity Futures Trade Commission that resulted in its withdrawal in 2022.
Chris Grove, Partner Emeritus at Eilers & Krejcik, said institutional support behind prediction markets is “accumulating a shocking level of momentum.”
“The investment from ICE caps a whirlwind few months that have seen bold-face names from venture, government, and traditional finance sign on to the vision of Kalshi and Polymarket,” he wrote on LinkedIn.
The news comes days after a number of the major traditional sportsbook providers suffered a dip in stock prices when Kalshi reported record trading volumes following week four of the NFL season and launched a similar product to sportsbooks’ same game parlays.
However, suggestions that the prediction platforms will become serious rivals for the sportsbooks have been played down by Jeffries, which pointed out that state-by-state web traffic data shows Kalshi’s users are growing more quickly in states where sports betting has not been regulated.
A note from the analyst firm stated: “The three major unregulated/restricted states (California, Florida and Texas) have accounted for 32% of Kalshi web traffic since the start of the NFL season, up from 26% prior to the season.
“Meanwhile, the three largest regulated states (Illinois, New Jersey, and New York) have shrunk from 23% to 19% of Kalshi traffic.”
ICE’s investment consideration will be made in cash and is not expected to have a material impact on its 2025 results or capital return plans.
ICE will provide further detail on the deal during its Q3 earnings call on 30 October.
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Investment values prediction markets platform at $8bn following re-entry into US market
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