Polymarket and Kalshi Each Targeting $20 Billion Valuations

And both companies are targeting the same valuation of $20 billion, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Saturday (March 7), citing sources familiar with the matter. 

These sources said both companies have each held talks with potential investors about funding rounds that would value them at around that number. The two companies were both valued at half that figure in late 2025.

The sources added that Kalshi recently crossed $1 billion in revenue run rate, an annualized revenue estimate, with one source saying that figure had risen to $1.5 billion. PYMNTS has contacted Polymarket for comment but has not yet gotten a reply. A spokesperson for Kalshi declined to comment.

WSJ noted that the talks are in early stages, and that there is no guarantee either company will hit that valuation, particularly as their businesses face increased scrutiny. Both Kalshi and Polymarket have been criticized for permitting bets on the U.S. attack on Iran and the ouster of that country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Last week, the report added, U.S. Reps. Blake Moore, R-Utah, and Salud Carbajal, D-Calif., introduced legislation  that would block Kalshi and Polymarket from offering markets on a range of topics, including war and sports.

This followed comments from Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., who said last weekend he planned to introduce legislation banning insider trades related to the conflict in Iran.

As PYMNTS wrote last month, the reality surrounding predictions market is a chaotic one, with “lots of sports volume, plus jurisdictional trench warfare.”

States are issuing cease-and-desist orders against several platforms (including Robinhood’s derivatives arm and Crypto.com), while the Commodities Future Trading Commission (CFTC) has signaled it may go to court to defend the federal government’s right to regulate the predictions space.

At the same time, the CFTC is reportedly working on new regulations governing event contracts. This is a sign, the report said, that “the grown-ups have arrived because the kids won’t stop inventing new ways to wager on reality.”

More recently, PYMNTS looked at the state of the prediction space amid the news that the CFTC is moving toward formal rulemaking for prediction markets, an attempt to define what belongs in finance as opposed to gambling. 

“It’s regulation-by-genre, as the product can look like a bet, be framed as a trade, and still end up in the same dopamine economy,” that report said.