A compact 36-minute Netflix documentary on prediction markets suggests a bleak future for these platforms. It’s difficult to disagree with the forecast.
From fraud to addiction, Netflix squeezed an impressive range of material into such a short film. The Prediction Games, released on Sunday, July 26, featured a balanced mix of perspectives on these federally sanctioned platforms, including a 19-year-old restaurant cook who said he loses almost everything he earns betting on Kalshi.
Not everyone loses in the zero-sum, peer-to-peer world of prediction markets. Sports bettor Isaac Rose-Berman and his sports trading team briefly discussed how they can make money using prediction markets. It’s similar to poker, where most lose but some sharper players can profit—at least for a while.
The film made clear that the real victors are the platforms and their investors (e.g., Donald Trump Jr.), and thus the rightful targets of criticism and even disdain. In casino terms, the platforms are the “house,” though prediction markets are not house-banked gambling like blackjack or a slot machine.
Tragically, the platforms have slot machine-like mechanics to maximize habitual use — “This is my life…just, like, refreshing, refreshing, refreshing,” as one apparent prediction market influencer was clipped in the film. Netflix didn’t feature an expert on addictive app design, arguably a blind spot for the filmmakers.
The core of the film was insider trading, fraud, and market manipulation, unsurprising considering these scandals are the most attention-grabbing, and the film ended by teasing the “stakes” of the upcoming U.S. midterm elections and the role prediction markets may have.
Lonely working and middle-class people losing money and struggling to pay their bills isn’t the flashiest centerpiece of a documentary on these platforms, even though I would argue this is where they are truly harmful, as opposed to their impacts on electoralism.
Can anything stop these platforms from growing their respective user bases and becoming more normalized? The film didn’t provide even the slimmest hope of an offramp. Fortunately, the future has the capacity to be very unpredictable, despite what prediction market CEOs may claim.
