When Elon Musk and Donald Trump sat down with Sean Hannity, prediction market traders had over $600,000 on what Trump would say—making every word coming out of the President’s mouth potentially valuable.
Outside of elections and major sports events, mention markets are among the most popular prediction market topics. Mention markets offer contracts on what a speaker will say during an event, whether it’s a speech, interview, or debate.
For example, crypto prediction market platform Polymarket offered a mention market on the vice presidential debate between Tim Walz and J.D. Vance. VP debate trade volume surged from $226,000 to almost $822,000 from the morning of the debate to the minutes after. Trading volume on the presidential debate saw a similar surge from $224,000 to $743,000.
Trading volume doesn’t just speak to how popular mention markets are but also how well-designed they are for live events. Prediction market odds update in real time, so traders can settle their trades quickly. Since the event is live and depends on whether a word or phrase is spoken enough times, settlement terms are clear, too. Traders also enjoy the flexibility of placing limit orders, which automatically buy or sell contracts at pre-set price thresholds.
Trump/Musk interview with Sean Hannity
On Tuesday evening, Fox News aired an interview with Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Kalshi opened a mention market on what Trump would say during that interview the day before, Monday morning.
After the market settled, trading volume reached over $600,000. It beat one of the other large political markets, Eric Adams’ likelihood of remaining in office until April, by about $70,000. Adams’ market had been open since Dec. 3, 2024. Instead of a slow drip of scandals every few weeks, Trump’s interview was a quick event where traders could bet and settle immediately. The gratification of a win and clarity of a loss both arrive in hours instead of months.
Prediction markets are also engagement tools for live events. Many people are on their phones while they’re watching events, and prediction markets are a way to use that second screen to make the event interactive.
The suspense of waiting to see whether a contract settles in a mention market makes each word during an interview potentially valuable. It draws traders into the event as live betting does with sports. That engagement is why live trading is so popular in mention markets. As in the 2024 campaign debates, trades during the Hannity interview market more than quadrupled from around $140,000 on the morning of the interview to over $636,000 the next day.
Growing demand for new mention markets
Mention markets were popular on Polymarket throughout the 2024 presidential campaign. Once Kalshi was cleared to offer election contracts, it began offering mention markets, too. Kalshi has also reduced the amount of time it takes to launch a market. Now that the company can launch a market within 24 hours, it can respond to events that gain traction in the news and that its customers want to see.
Mention markets aren’t the only markets that are in demand. Customers have engaged with Kalshi on social media to request new markets. A trader suggested an over/under market on the amount of gold in Fort Knox, following Senator Rand Paul’s request that Musk audit the gold stored there. The trader suggested the Fort Knox gold market on Tuesday, and within an hour, a Kalshi executive responded that the Fort Knox market could be live as soon as Thursday.
This is how startups win. @Kalshi had someone suggest a new prediction market for how much gold is in Fort Knox.
— Anthony Pompliano 🌪 (@APompliano) February 18, 2025
Within an hour the team confirmed they will launch the desired market this week.
Content is changing. Prediction markets don't lie. And Kalshi is operating at… pic.twitter.com/rH3pRnuU7F
While mention markets are the most engaging live markets, the ability to suggest markets based on popular storylines in the news gives traders a mix of live events and stories that unfold over weeks. This range of engagement speaks to the ability of prediction markets to function as content, entertainment, and financial instruments. Prediction markets are versatile products whose flexibility mirrors the myriad events they can be based on.
