Predicting the World Cup "final showdown": Over 150 projects poised to launch.

Author: momo, ChainCatcher

Prediction markets are one of the most lucrative sectors in the crypto world recently, and a rare phenomenon that has bucked the trend and gained momentum during a bear market.

On March 27, Polymarket received another $600 million investment from ICE, the parent company of the NYSE, bringing its total funding to $2.879 billion; its competitor Kalshi is not far behind, having raised a total of $2.515 billion, with a valuation of $22 billion.

Although the leading players have a clear lead in terms of funding scale and trading activity, new entrants continue to emerge.

Leading exchanges, including Binance and Coinbase, are accelerating their expansion through wallet integrations and acquisitions. For example, Binance Wallet recently announced the launch of its prediction market feature, integrating Predict.fun as a provider. Paradigm is also developing a prediction market trading terminal for professional traders and market makers. With the World Cup approaching (starting in about two months), prediction markets are likely to experience a new surge in traffic. This article will examine the latest landscape of prediction markets from a financing and investment perspective, and review some early representative projects and their differentiated paths. Nearly $6 billion in funding, but 30% of projects have ceased operations. According to incomplete statistics from RootData, of the more than 230 prediction market projects included, over 50 have received public funding, totaling $5.687 billion. However, it's worth noting that of these 230+ projects, only over 150 are currently operating, while over 70 have ceased operations, representing a near one-third failure rate. This reflects that while the sector is highly attractive to investors, project survival is not easy. Furthermore, capital distribution in this sector is extremely concentrated. Polymarket and Kalshi together raised $5.394 billion, accounting for approximately 94.85% of the total funding in the sector. This means that the remaining 50-plus projects share only about 5% of the funding, indicating a high concentration of capital in the hands of these two giants. Among them: 7 projects raised $10 million or more (excluding Polymarket and Kalshi): Novig ($75 million), Opinion ($25 million), Space ($20 million in public offering, community questioning of its soft Rug), Limitless ($17 million), The Clearing Company ($15 million, acquired); Noise ($14.1 million), and Polynado ($10 million). 3 projects raised between $5 million and $10 million: AetheriumX ($8 million), 42 ($7.2 million), and Augur ($5 million). The vast majority of projects with disclosed funding amounts are below $5 million, and the funding stages are highly concentrated in the seed and pre-seed rounds. In terms of funding pace, capital attention to the prediction market has clearly increased since the second half of 2024, and further accelerated into an active period in 2025. Entering 2026, 16 funding events have already occurred in the first four months alone, maintaining a frequency of almost one per week. Overall, on the one hand, leading projects continue to receive large amounts of additional funding, and on the other hand, early-stage projects have also begun to receive intensive exploratory investments, showing a dual characteristic of "leader strengthening + long-tail diffusion" in the sector. Meanwhile, leading players are accelerating their expansion in the prediction market through mergers and acquisitions. For example, Polymarket acquired Dome, a prediction market API company; Coinbase acquired The Clearing Company, founded by Kalshi and a former growth director at Polymarket; and Gemini acquired Guesser, a very early-stage player in the field. In this duopoly, how can early-stage projects break through? Aside from the two giants, Polymarket and Kalshi, other early-stage projects find it difficult to compete head-on in terms of funding and scale. Therefore, they are seeking breakthroughs in niche scenarios, trading mechanisms, and product positioning. One obvious direction is verticalization. For example, Novig only focuses on sports predictions, avoiding politics and entertainment, thus mastering a single category. Another direction is innovation in trading mechanisms. For example, Noise and OmenX have chosen to directly introduce the leverage mechanism of derivatives into prediction markets; 42 packages each prediction result into a small token similar to meme coins, which can be bought and sold at any time on the bonding curve. This "prediction as trading" approach differs from traditional binary betting. There are also a number of projects that choose not to be platforms, but tools. Polynado positions itself as a "Bloomberg terminal" for prediction markets, using AI to proactively discover trends and generate markets; Kairos and TradeFox are cross-platform aggregated trading terminals, helping users manage positions in multiple prediction markets in one place. They don't directly compete with Polymarket's users, but instead attempt to become the underlying infrastructure of the entire sector. Furthermore, compliance and capital efficiency are also differentiating strategies. Novig uses a sweepstakes model (free coins + cash coins) to circumvent the definition of gambling, while predict.fun allows users' prediction funds to generate additional returns during participation. A number of other projects are also focusing on traffic entry points and distribution. Melee enhances users' social sharing; Myriad, through browser plugins, directly embeds prediction functionality into media pages such as Twitter and YouTube, allowing users to place bets while browsing content. They don't try to get users to actively "enter" a prediction market; instead, they deliver predictions directly to users. The involvement of AI is also lowering the barrier to entry for creating prediction markets. worm.wtf allows users to input prompts, and AI generates prediction markets with a single click; Polynado similarly uses AI to automatically discover emerging trends and build markets in advance. This shifts the supply side of prediction markets from "human-selected topics" to "algorithm-driven." In general, leading players compete on funding and scale, while smaller projects showcase their strengths in vertical scenarios, trading mechanisms, tool positioning, AI generation, and traffic distribution. Below is a brief overview of some early-stage projects: 1. Novig Novig is the prediction market project with the most funding, besides Polymarket and Kalshi. Founded in 2021, the project just secured $75 million in funding this February, led by Pantera Capital, valuing the company at $500 million post-money. Novig's defining characteristic is its focus solely on the sports sector. It currently uses a sweepstakes operating model to avoid being defined as "gambling." What does this mean? It employs two types of virtual currency: Free Coins (Novig Coins): These are obtained free of charge by users and used to participate in various "games" or "bets" on the platform. Because users do not use real money to purchase participation opportunities, legally, this does not constitute "gambling." Novig Cash: Users need to purchase it with real money or obtain it through participation in activities. Rewards won using this currency can be exchanged for real cash. Similar to virtual currency in games, users typically purchase "virtual currency packs" to gain more "game opportunities" or a better experience. This is essentially gambling with real money, but legally, users are "purchasing virtual goods," not "betting." Novig has officially applied to the CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) for a Designated Contract Market (DCM) license, aiming to operate legally in all 50 states and become a regulated prediction market exchange with a monthly trading volume of approximately $300 million. Regarding the team, both co-founders, Jacob Fortinsky and others, are graduates of Harvard and have investment banking experience. 2. Opinion (OPN) Opinion (formerly O.LAB) is a prediction market within the BNB Chain ecosystem. YZi Labs has invested in two rounds of funding. Opinion's three rounds of funding have exceeded $25 million, with investments from Hack VC, Amber Group, Animoca Ventures, Jump, and other institutions. It launched its token in early March. Opinion's distinguishing feature is its integration of AI concepts, mentioning that the platform uses AI Oracles to assist in market creation and prediction generation. However, during TGE, Opinion's fundraising, trading volume data, and airdrops were all met with market skepticism. 3. Limitless (LMTS) Limitless is a social protocol within the Base ecosystem. It has raised a total of $17 million in funding, with participation from Coinbase Ventures, 1 Confirmation, and other institutions. Limitless was TGE in October 2025, but faced community skepticism due to issues such as airdrops. Limitless's predictive features include support for short-term price predictions and trading of crypto assets and stocks. The team's founders & CEO/CTO previously worked at Gitcoin and are holders of the Optimism citizen badge. Its COO, Roman Mogylnyi, was the co-founder of the viral AI face-swapping app Reface. 4. Polynado Polynado positions itself as an AI-native prediction infrastructure. In December 2025, it completed a $10 million investment from LD Capital, Waterdrip Capital, and others. It is not a standalone prediction market platform, but rather aims to build a "Bloomberg terminal-level" intelligence data layer for on-chain prediction markets like Polymarket. It proactively discovers emerging trends and automatically generates markets through AI, building and trading these markets in advance before the market even notices them. 5. predict.fun Binance Wallet recently announced the launch of its prediction market, with predict.fun as its main provider. predict.fun announced in December 2025 that it had received investment from YZi Labs. predict.fun's model is characterized by allowing users' funds used for predictions to generate additional returns during the prediction period, rather than remaining idle. In early March, it also acquired another prediction market, Probable. predict.fun's founder, dingaling, was previously the head of research at Binance, co-founder of PancakeSwap, a well-known NFT whale, and also founded the token issuance platform boop.fun. However, dingaling has previously been questioned by the community for constantly chasing trends in startups, and there are rumors that he had disputes with Binance and CZ. Recommended Reading: "Frenemies Reconcile? CZ Joins Forces with Former Employees to Launch Prediction Platform predict.fun" 6. Melee Melee is a prediction market on Solana, positioned as a "Viral Markets." It completed a $3.5 million pre-seed round of funding, led by Variant, with participation from DBA and several angel investors including Meltem Demirors, Chief Strategy Officer of CoinShares, Anatoly Yakovenko, co-founder of Solana Labs, and Santiago Roel Santos, an investor in Web3. Melee's defining characteristic is its emphasis on social interaction and viral spread. It allows users to create fact or opinion marketplaces (such as pop culture and sports) without permission, and the platform enhances user engagement through social integrations (such as one-click sharing via X/Discord). Furthermore, Melee has a unique feature that allows users to bet on the "market as a whole" (a share of all outcomes) instead of betting on a specific yes/no or multiple-choice result. This is equivalent to betting on the growth and popularity of the entire market, rather than on a specific right or wrong answer, making it suitable for users who are optimistic about a topic's popularity but uncertain about the specific outcome. 7. The Clearing Company (acquired by Coinbase) The Clearing Company has been acquired by Coinbase. It previously completed a $15 million seed round of funding, led by USV, with participation from well-known institutions such as Coinbase Ventures. Its founder, Toni Gemayel, was formerly the head of growth at Kalshi and Polymarket. His goal was to combine the openness of decentralization with the credibility of regulatory compliance, creating a new generation of prediction markets that is both acceptable to retail investors and favored by regulators. 8. AetheriumX AetheriumX is an early-stage prediction market project that completed an $8 million strategic funding round in January of this year, with investments from CGV, GAINS Associates, DuckDAO, Genesis Capital, and others. According to official information, its key feature is that it allows users' funds to be dynamically routed to different DeFi protocols, RWA, or GameFi activities, improving fund efficiency. 9. Myriad Myriad, incubated by DASTAN, the parent company of Decrypt and Rug Radio, recently completed a seed round of funding with participation from MoonPay, Thomas Lee, and others. Its key feature is its focus on embedding prediction markets into news and social media pages such as Twitter, YouTube, and Decrypt through browser extensions, allowing users to participate in predictions directly using stablecoins while browsing content. Myriad is already integrated into Trust Wallet. 10. Noise Noise is a prediction market within the Base ecosystem. It has raised over $14 million in funding, with Paradigm leading its seed round, and GSR, Figment Capital, and Kaito among the investors. Unlike platforms like Polymarket that allow binary betting on event outcomes, Noise allows users to leverage their bullish or bearish views on topics, trends, or brands. Its core principle is to transform "internet attention" into a continuously tradable financial asset. Noise launched its testnet last May and recently opened its waiting list for applications. 11, 42 42, formerly known as Alkimiya, is now renamed 42. In 2021 and 2023, the team received investment from Castle Island Ventures, 1kx, Coinbase Ventures, Dragonfly, Circle Ventures, and other institutions. 42's unique feature is its combination of "event prediction" and a "meme launch platform" mechanism, allowing each possible outcome of an event to be made into a small token similar to meme coins. You can buy and sell on the bonding curve at any time, just like trading meme coins. When the event truly ends (e.g., election results or competition conclusion), the platform will conduct a final settlement based on the actual results. 12. Kairos Kairos is not a standalone prediction market platform, but a Web3 prediction market trading terminal, a unified execution and intelligence layer that aggregates data and trading functions from multiple prediction markets. Kairos received $2.5 million in funding led by a16z in February of this year. 13. OmenX OmenX is a decentralized prediction market platform that supports leveraged trading. Users can trade the outcomes of real-world events in crypto, sports, and finance by buying and selling long and short positions. On March 30th, OmenX announced it had secured millions of dollars in funding from Paramita and M77 Ventures. 14. TradeFox TradeFox (formerly factCheck), incubated by AllianceDAO, initially focused on creating a Polymarket-like platform for debunking news, allowing users to bet on the veracity of events. However, it later transformed into a prediction market aggregator, consolidating fragmented prediction markets into a seamless trading platform. It allows users to leverage real-world events (such as political elections, sporting events, and crypto price fluctuations), with a trading interface very similar to Hyperliquid. TradeFox has launched its mainnet. 15. worm.wtf worm.wtf is a prediction market within the Solana ecosystem. It supports AIGC, allowing users to simply input prompts, and the platform helps them instantly generate prediction markets. Conclusion The growth of prediction markets is far from over. In the first quarter of 2026, trading volume reached $75 billion, a 70% increase from the previous quarter, and prediction markets are expected to further expand their reach during the World Cup. Even more noteworthy is the accelerated adoption in traditional finance. JPMorgan Chase's CEO has stated his intention to offer prediction market services, and Wall Street brokers such as Clear Street and Marex are actively integrating with the platform. These signals open up considerable possibilities for the future traffic, compliance, and commercialization of prediction markets. Regarding the market structure, the highly concentrated market share is unlikely to change in the short term. Both funding and trading volume are currently firmly concentrated on Polymarket and Kalshi, whose compliance efforts are accelerating. Given that nearly one-third of the more than 230 projects have ceased operations, the difficulty of successfully operating a prediction market is far greater than imagined. Dragonfly partner Haseeb Qureshi predicted that 90% of prediction market products would remain untouched by the end of the year. This is not an exaggeration. The leading companies have built strong competitive advantages through liquidity, compliant distribution, and continuous subsidies, making it difficult for newcomers to break through simply by imitation. However, in the medium to long term, new players are not without opportunities. Delphi Digital points out that the real breakthrough lies not in direct competition with Polymarket, but in splitting the technology stack to serve different user types. For example, aggregated terminals and advanced analytics tools meet the needs of professional traders; social interfaces attempt to tap into the broader mass entertainment market. Furthermore, the addition of AI agents will quickly eliminate arbitrage opportunities in the binary market, driving funds to migrate to new mechanisms. Prediction markets are evolving into infrastructure for options, insurance, and governance, not just speculative tools. For ordinary users, with the constant influx of new projects, the risk of being "ripped off" needs to be taken seriously. Opinion is a recent example: impressive funding, an AI narrative, and endorsements from major institutions, but after TGE, it faced data skepticism, reduced airdrops, and community backlash. Similar scenarios are expected to repeat themselves. The competitive landscape is far from settled, but for those newcomers claiming to "disrupt Polymarket and Kalshi," it's best to let things develop a bit more.