Polymarket and company have sophisticated gambling addiction to the point of making it indistinguishable from “investing”

Prediction markets are no longer a niche of the Internet and datanerds to become the new obsession of Wall Street and Silicon Valley. Platforms like Polymarket and Kalshi are receiving multi-billion dollar valuations by repackaging traditional bets as sophisticated financial instruments. The image that defines the moment occurred recently in Manhattan, according to Bloomberg: the patriarch of the New York Stock Exchange (70 years old, impeccable suit) closing a multimillion-dollar deal with the founder of Polymarket (27 years old, t-shirt and plastic bottle). That meeting sealed the fate of the sector: betting is no longer a game, it is finance. Why is it important. We are facing a radical cultural and regulatory change. By redefining bets as “event contracts”, these platforms try to circumvent gambling legislation (which in Spain would control Consumption) to sneak into the traditional financial system, with the support of giants such as the owners of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The panoramic. Kalshi is already worth $10 billion and Polymarket is looking for $12 billion. They are not beach bars, as we said, the owner of the NYSE has invested there. The hockey league (NHL) and Donald Trump’s media company are already signing deals. It is the traditional financial system embracing chance. It is, above all, legitimation. Semantic reengineering. Polymarket’s true success is not technological, it is linguistic. They have eliminated the stigma of the gambler by changing the dictionary: It’s not a bet. It’s an “investment.” It is not a betting house. It’s a “exchange of contracts”. You are not a gambler. you are a trader which analyzes “market sentiment.” An example of the absurdity of some cases: people betting by Elon Musk entering the race to be president of the United States, oblivious to the fact that Musk was born in South Africa and therefore cannot become president, since the US Constitution vetoes the presidency to foreigners. That is to say: all those bets are money thrown away from minute one. How it works. Instead of betting 50 euros on Trump winning, you buy a “share” of that result that is worth 1 dollar if you are right. This allows the same person who would win or lose money at roulette to now win or lose it in an app with stock market charts. Although the savings fly the same, the user feels smarter and less guilty: he believes that he is operating in something more similar to the IBEX, not in a casino. What’s coming. There is a civil war brewing. The old guard of the game (the owners of traditional casinos) see this as unfair competition. Jay Snowden, CEO of Penn Entertainment (a casino and sports betting company), has already warned: This is a direct threat to your industry. Prediction markets and games of chance overlap. In conclusion. Polymarket has managed to sophisticate gambling addiction for a generation that believes itself too smart to play games of chance. They have created the perfect casino for those who despise casinos, allowing them to risk savings under the illusion of doing financial analysis. In Xataka | Five years ago he worked from his bathroom on the brink of ruin. Today he runs a company valued at 8 billion Featured image | Hush Naidoo Jade PhotographyMockuuups Studio

‘Gambling Man’ is the portrait of the man capable of betting billions after a 12 -minute conversation. And lose

Technological capitalism continuously disappoints its investors regarding what continually promises them. In 2022, when Masayoshi are announced losses of 23,000 million dollars in softbankthe market pretended to surprise what was inevitable: the collapse of a bubble inflated by the megalomania of its architects itself. It was not the first time they were seeing a fortune evaporate. He had already lost 99% of his wealth in the Crash of the ‘Puntocom’. The pattern is repeated because it should be repeated: the eternal reproduction of the same, where each cycle of boom and Bust Technological needs its own prophets and martyrs. They are represents both roles with particular dedication. Lionel Barber’s new biography about Masayhoshi are‘Gambling Man‘, portrays a man who has turned the extreme risk into a show. The book aims to unravel the genius after seemingly irrational decisions, but ends up revealing something more important: how modern technological capitalism has normalized recklessness as business virtue. They are, who like to compare with Napoleon and Genghis Khan, embodies the violence of a system that has made the disruption its mantra. Invest 4,400 million dollars in Wework After a 12 -minute conversation because it can do it – as well portrayed the phenomenal Wecrashedfrom Apple Tv+ – because el System rewards the grandiloquent gesture about rigorous analysis. Economic rationality is subordinated to the imperative of the show. The mechanism needs, of course, a distortion of the objectives it says. SoftBank does not really seek to identify the best technological companies in the future, seeks to feed the narrative that you can do it. The reality is that the Vision Fund It operates as a validation machine: Validation for Son, which found in money and success a way to overcome discrimination suffered in postwar Japan; validation for founders who receive their investments; Validation for a market that needs to believe that someone, somewhere, can see the future. “If you are intelligent you do not need leverage, and if you are silly you should not use it,” said Warren Buffett, who in addition to being the best investor in history is a great representative of a more sober and methodical capitalism. Perhaps the first is not understood without the second. They are represents the antithesis of buffet: a system where the mass leverage –SoftBank came to accumulate more than 150,000 million in debt– It is not a means but an end in itself. Debt as a show, as a demonstration of power. What surprises is not that they are survived their failures, but that the system needs them. Each multimillionaire loss reinforces its misunderstanding image, willing to bet against consensus. “At some point, everyone will tell you that you are crazy,” he proclaims. The line between vision and reckless has become deliberately diffuse. Today, while driving A new multimillionaire bet in chips for AIThey are still playing their role in this work. The public applauds because it must applaud: the fiction that after each new technological bubble there is a visionary genius is too comforting to abandon it. He show It must continue, although we all know how it ends. The Gambling Man: The Wild Ride of Japan’s Masayoshi are Outstanding image | Wikipedia CommonsXataka In Xataka | Who are the largest millionaires in Spain: the list of the ten richest people in the country

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