US prediction platforms are pursuing an increasingly aggressive strategy to win over users. The Polymarkt announced last weekthat it will open a free supermarket in New York on February 12, just as its rival Kalshi is also tempting passersby with $50 worth of free food at a Manhattan market. And the start of the Super Bowl on Sunday acts as a catalyst, with both companies hoping that in addition to betting, potential users will take note of their sign-up.
The race starts in New York
The food crisis in New York turned out to be an ideal campaign tool for prediction markets. Over the past six years, food prices in the United States have risen by about 30%, but the situation in New York is even more critical. According to a March 2025 survey, nearly 90% of New Yorkers believe food prices are rising faster than wages.
The crisis caused such social tension that Zohran Mamdani, the new mayor of New York, promised in his campaign to establish city-run supermarkets. Kalshi founder Tarek raised the idea during a casual conversation during halftime of a Knicks game that they should respond to the food crisis with tangible action. As a result, the first 50 visitors to a market in Manhattan organized by Kalshi on February 4 received free food worth $50 per person. The line formed half an hour before the start and grew to the length of an entire city block. A 19-year-old bartender, Henry, put it this way:
$50 for about three hours of my work – that’s a lot.
But of course Polymarket didn’t give up. He immediately announced on social media that he will open a physical store in New York on February 12, but not like Kalshi’s temporary pop-up solution, but a real, 24/7 store, completely free, without registration and conditions.
The ICE deal: Polymarket’s real comeback
However, Polymarket’s move is part of a much larger strategy beyond food donation. In recent months, the platform has made a monumental return to the US market after being banned from the US in 2022.
In October 2025, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, invested up to $2 billion in Polymarket, increasing the company’s valuation to $9 billion. However, the real value of ICE’s investment is not so much the amount, but the performance. Through ICE’s global network, Polymarket’s forecast data can reach banks, brokerage firms and institutional traders and be integrated into the terminals and risk management systems that professional traders use every day. What mainstream finance has done so far is crypto “underground” treated as a platform, it has now been elevated to a legitimate level by one of Wall Street’s best-known institutions.
The partnership also means that Shayne Coplan, the founder of Polymarket, has become the youngest self-made billionaire on Bloomberg’s list at the age of 27. ICE promises that Polymarket’s forecast data will be distributed globally, which could lead to market prices on US politics, economic issues and other events – backed by real money risks – appearing in institutional decision-making.
Political background: the rise of prediction markets
However, the prediction markets collide with political reality in several places. In Hungary, the SZTFH banned both Polymarket and Kalshi. The users of the prediction markets already included the outcome of the Hungarian elections in their predictions last year, and Polymarket previously included political events in its offering. However, the real power of such platforms lies not in guessing who the next leader will be, but in allowing people to back up their opinions with money, creating a decentralized, government-independent market consensus.
It’s a matter of consumer protection
New York State Attorney General Letitia James warned residents that prediction markets do not provide as strong consumer protection guarantees as heavily regulated platforms. The U.S. Commodity Exchange Commission (CFTC) continues to investigate how these services fit into the U.S. regulatory framework. For example, Polymarket only received final authorization to operate in the United States in January of this year.
Marketing gimmick or real help?
Both platforms are clearly confident that people interested in donating food or visiting the free store will get the hang of the basic idea, and many of them will sign up for the app, either for betting related to the Super Bowl on February 9 or for events afterwards. However, compared to the institutional validation of ICE, food campaigns are more of a communication and PR action.
Millions of people in the United States are already aware of prediction markets, so the significant increase in new users comes mainly from the institutional background, rather than from these campaigns. Prediction markets are evolving from a fringe crypto asset to a mainstream financial infrastructure. The competition between Kalshi and Polymarket is just one of the first steps in this transformation.
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