Analysis

    One Data Company Now Supplies Both Kalshi and Polymarket — And That Changes Everything

    Genius Sports signed official-data and integrity deals with Kalshi and Polymarket days apart, becoming the settlement backbone for both rival platforms.

    By PredictionMarkets.usSunday, August 9, 20269 min read
    One Data Company Now Supplies Both Kalshi and Polymarket — And That Changes Everything

    In the span of 24 hours in early August, Genius Sports Limited signed official data and integrity agreements with both Kalshi and Polymarket — the two largest CFTC-regulated prediction market platforms in the United States. One company now supplies the official settlement layer for both rival exchanges. That is a structural change for the industry.

    The Deals, 24 Hours Apart

    Genius Sports Limited (NYSE: GENI) is a publicly traded, New York-based company that has spent two decades building the official sports data infrastructure used by regulated betting operators worldwide. On August 4, 2026, it announced a comprehensive partnership with Polymarket's CFTC-regulated U.S. platform. One day later, on August 5, it announced a second deal with Kalshi.

    The Polymarket agreement covers official sports data, exclusive U.S. live streaming rights for selected competitions including Italy's Serie A, league intellectual property, and integrity services. The deal took effect immediately for eligible U.S. users.

    The Kalshi agreement covers official real-time data across Genius Sports' full soccer portfolio — the English Premier League, Serie A, Liga MX, the Argentine Primera División, and France's Ligue 1 — plus marketing services through Genius's Legend-owned media properties and integrity information-sharing provisions. No start date was specified.

    Neither company disclosed financial terms for either deal.

    What Official Settlement Data Changes

    To understand why these agreements matter, it helps to understand how prediction market contracts resolve without them.

    When a sports event contract settles, the platform determines the result by aggregating publicly available information: news feeds, broadcast data, official box scores. On close or disputed plays — a goal disallowed by video review, a race finish under protest, a pitch clock violation — different public sources can report different things in the minutes immediately after the event. That ambiguity has historically created resolution delays and occasional disputes on prediction market platforms.

    Official sports data removes the ambiguity. The feed comes directly from the leagues themselves, verified at the same point of origin that licensed sportsbooks across the United States use to settle their own wagers. The result is a single authoritative source rather than an editorial aggregation.

    "By using verified official data as a consistent source of truth to settle sports prediction market contracts, the agreement is designed to enhance transparency while reducing reliance on unofficial or delayed data sources," Genius Sports stated in its announcement with Kalshi.

    "Genius Sports' official data will be used to determine the outcome and settlement of covered sports contracts, ensuring each market resolves using the same verified event information supplied to professional leagues," the Polymarket announcement stated.

    The language is intentionally parallel — both platforms signed up for the same foundational standard.

    Integrity: What Both Platforms Agreed to Do

    Beyond settlement data, both agreements include integrity information-sharing provisions that go further than what either platform previously operated under independently.

    Under both deals, Kalshi and Polymarket join Genius Sports' established integrity network, giving sports leagues and governing bodies real-time visibility into trading activity around their competitions. The Polymarket announcement described this as "enabling real-time coordination around irregular trading patterns."

    The Kalshi deal contains an additional commitment: Kalshi agreed to "restrict certain market types" as part of the integrity provisions. The announcement did not specify which market types.

    "Our partnership with Genius Sports gives professional leagues direct visibility into prediction market activity around their competitions and reflects the standard we hold across every official league relationship we build," said Ari Borod, President of Sports Business Development at Polymarket.

    The timing of these provisions is not coincidental. The prediction market sector has come under increasing scrutiny over insider trading concerns — the CFTC's enforcement action against former U.S. Representative George Santos, which resulted in disgorgement of profits and a three-year trading ban, involved trading event contracts on proceedings in which he was himself the subject. Real-time league visibility into market activity is the structural mechanism designed to surface those patterns before they become enforcement cases.

    "Adam Barrick, Head of Sports Partnerships at Kalshi, noted: "As the prediction market ecosystem continues to expand at a rapid pace, the use of official data and integrity services is more important than ever. We're proud to partner with Genius Sports, with their proven track record in providing the highest quality sports data and working alongside leagues to protect the transparency of sporting competitions."

    Polymarket Gets Live Streaming; Kalshi Does Not

    The two deals are not identical. Polymarket's agreement adds something Kalshi's does not: exclusive U.S. live streaming rights for selected competitions, beginning with Serie A.

    U.S. users on Polymarket's CFTC-regulated platform can now watch live Serie A matches directly alongside the related prediction market contracts. The arrangement marks the first time a CFTC-regulated prediction market platform has paired live sports streaming with real-time event contracts in the United States.

    "The partnership will make Polymarket a pioneer in pairing live sports streams with related real-time event contracts in a CFTC-regulated prediction-market platform," Genius Sports stated.

    The commercial logic is straightforward: a user watching a Serie A match on Polymarket is more likely to place trades on that match in real time than one who has to switch between a streaming app and a trading platform. Engagement compounds. Polymarket's existing official league portfolio — which already spans MLB, Liga MX, Bundesliga, La Liga, Serie A, MLS, NHL, and UFC — gains a new engagement layer through the streaming rights.

    The Kalshi deal does not include streaming, but it does include access to Genius Sports' Legend-owned media properties for marketing purposes. Legend operates a network of review and comparison sites — often the first stop for someone searching for where to trade prediction markets — giving Kalshi a customer acquisition channel embedded in its data partnership.

    Genius Sports: The Q2 Signal

    Genius Sports announced its second-quarter 2026 financial results on August 6 — one day after the Kalshi deal closed. The company beat its guidance and raised its full-year outlook. The results already credit prediction markets with an incremental contribution to margin.

    "Over the past few months, both Kalshi and Polymarket have partnered with leagues like the Argentine Football Association, Liga MX, and Serie A, each built on official data and integrity from Genius," said Matt Locke, Chief Executive Officer of Genius Sports, on the company's Q2 earnings call. "Building on those league partnerships, we've now established direct commercial agreements with both prediction market platforms, covering a wide range of content across our data portfolio."

    The progression Locke described — league partnerships first, platform agreements next — reflects a deliberate strategy. Genius Sports established its data rights within individual league deals, then used those relationships to sign the platforms that trade on those leagues. The result is a position in which Genius Sports supplies both of the leading U.S. prediction market exchanges simultaneously, occupying the same neutral infrastructure role it plays in traditional regulated sportsbooks.

    "Prediction markets will scale on a foundation of trusted, fast and accurate data, reliable technology and robust integrity services, and that is exactly where Genius Sports is uniquely positioned," said Sean Conroy, EVP of Rights & Partnerships at Genius Sports. "This partnership with Kalshi demonstrates how we can provide the essential technology layer that enables accurate and transparent sports markets."

    What This Means for the Prediction Market Industry

    Genius Sports is not alone in targeting the prediction market sector. Sportradar — the other major sports data company that competes with Genius globally — has also recently signed multi-year partnerships with leading prediction market operators. The simultaneous arrival of both major official data companies reflects a shared assessment: the U.S. prediction market sector has reached commercial scale, and the infrastructure layer is worth building on.

    This is a meaningful industry signal. In regulated sports betting markets — New Jersey, Illinois, New York, and elsewhere — official data agreements are standard requirements, not optional upgrades. The fact that both Kalshi and Polymarket now operate under those same standards puts prediction markets on the same operational footing as traditional licensed sportsbooks, at least in terms of how their sports contracts are settled and monitored.

    It also matters for the ongoing state-versus-federal jurisdiction debate. Multiple state attorneys general have argued that prediction market platforms are operating outside the integrity safeguards that licensed sportsbooks are required to maintain. The Genius Sports deals — with their real-time league monitoring and official data settlement — directly address that criticism at the operational level, regardless of how the legal disputes ultimately resolve.

    What This Means for Traders on Both Platforms

    Settlement is clearer. For soccer contracts on the leagues covered by Genius Sports' portfolio — EPL, Serie A, Liga MX, Argentine Primera División, and Ligue 1 — outcomes will settle from verified official feeds rather than aggregated public sources. That means faster resolution and fewer ambiguous outcomes.

    Integrity monitoring is real-time. Both platforms now have leagues actively monitoring trading activity around their competitions. For straightforward traders, this strengthens the fairness of markets. For anyone attempting to exploit non-public information, the surveillance network makes that considerably more difficult.

    Live streaming on Polymarket. U.S. users on Polymarket's regulated platform gain a new watching experience for Serie A and other selected competitions — live match feeds directly alongside the contracts tracking their outcomes.

    Marketing reach expands. Both platforms gain access to Genius Sports' Legend media network for customer acquisition. More traffic from organic search means more potential counterparties for every trade.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What is Genius Sports? Genius Sports Limited (NYSE: GENI) is a publicly traded company that supplies official real-time sports data, live streaming rights, and integrity services to regulated betting operators worldwide. It holds direct data rights from major leagues including the English Premier League, Serie A, Liga MX, and others.

    Does this mean contract resolution is more accurate now on those platforms? For soccer leagues in Genius Sports' portfolio — EPL, Serie A, Liga MX, Argentine Primera División, Ligue 1 — yes. Contracts tied to those competitions will now settle from verified official feeds, the same data source that licensed sportsbooks use.

    Why did Polymarket get live streaming and Kalshi did not? The deals were negotiated separately and reflect different commercial packages. Polymarket already held an exclusive Serie A partnership in the U.S., which made streaming rights a natural addition. The Kalshi deal covers the same data and integrity core but does not include streaming at launch.

    Are these deals exclusive arrangements? The announcements did not describe either deal as exclusive. Both platforms received access to Genius Sports' official data portfolio, not a lock on that data against their competitors.

    What does joining the integrity information-sharing network mean for traders? It means sports leagues now have real-time visibility into trading patterns on their competitions through the Genius Sports network. The goal is to surface irregular activity — not to expose individual traders' positions or identities.

    Conclusion

    With official data deals signed with both Kalshi and Polymarket in a single week, Genius Sports has become the foundational data layer underneath the U.S. prediction market industry's two leading exchanges. The legal battles over state jurisdiction will continue to play out in courtrooms. But beneath the litigation, the operational infrastructure of a mature regulated market is being assembled — official data feeds, real-time integrity networks, and live streaming rights included.

    Prediction markets are not just a legal argument anymore. They are a sector building toward permanence, one infrastructure deal at a time.

    Track live sports prediction market odds at PredictionMarkets.US.

    Sources & Verification

    Back to Articles