Kalshi is taking its relationship with the NHL to the next level with its first prediction markets partnership with a professional sports team.
Kalshi announced Tuesday that it will be the official prediction market partner of the Chicago Blackhawks. It comes about two months after the NHL announced it was partnering with both Kalshi and Polymarket as the league’s official prediction market partners.
At the time, Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour put a lot of weight behind the agreement, announcing that the partnership shows makes it “clear” that “prediction markets are here to stay.”
Unfortunately for Mansour, the NHL is so far the only league letting prediction markets join the game. Not only have the other major leagues not partnered with predictions operators, they have said they are worried about the proliferation of sports predictions.
Other leagues show concern
The NHL may be a major U.S. sports league, but it is far and away fourth on the list with healthy gap behind the other three, who are not ready to play ball.
The NBA voiced its concern over sports predictions in May. Alex Roth, the NBA’s assistant general counsel of league governance and policy, said in a letter to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that “the integrity risks posed by sports prediction markets are more significant and more difficult to manage that those presented by legal, regulated sports gambling.”
The MLB also told the CFTC in that the integrity and consumer protections of sports betting needed to be replicated for sports predictions because of the similar resemblance. The league also posted letters near team locker rooms in August telling players that participating in prediction markets would be a violation of its sports betting policy.
In written testimony for a December meeting concerning reauthorization of the CFTC, the NFL shared integrity concerns and said the regulator needed to prohibit objectionable bets along with implementing other consumer and integrity protection measures.
