Kalshi volume reporting faces scrutiny as combo bets make up about 61% of prediction market activity

Kalshi is facing fresh scrutiny over how it reports trading activity, with criticism that first emerged around its crypto perpetuals now spreading to its core prediction market business. Traders had questioned why ETH perpetual open interest was only in the low millions of dollars while daily volume ran into the hundreds of millions, producing unusually high turnover figures. Kalshi crypto lead IcoBeast responded by separating the perpetuals business from the crypto prediction market, saying the prediction market does not use the same kind of market-making rebates and that its reporting methodology can be compared with peers. The debate did not stop there. Prediction market trader @retardmode said roughly 61% of Kalshi’s disclosed volume comes from multi-event combination bets, or parlays, where several outcomes are bundled into a single ticket and all must be correct to win. According to that explanation, Kalshi counts volume based on the $1 face value of each contract rather than the user’s actual cash outlay. In one example, a user spends $1 on a combo ticket that pays $14.1 if every leg wins, while the platform records $14.1 in volume. Based on that method, Kalshi’s real daily volume was estimated at about $136 million, versus $1.91 billion reported publicly.