Kalshi co-founder and CEO Tarek Mansour spoke at Axios House DC on Tuesday, reconfirming that the majority of traders who use the prediction market platform lose money in the long term. In a one-on-one interview with Axios business reporter Nathan Bomey, Mansour defended the win/loss reality of trading while comparing prediction markets to the stock market and competitive sports events.
WATCH: Tarek Mansour Interview at Axios House DC (July 14th, 2026)
“So what is the expectation?” asked the 30-year-old MIT graduate at the 4:30 mark of the 10-minute video segment. “That fifty-fifty, people win/lose? If that were the case, then let’s just flip a coin.” Mansour went on to say that “this is a game of skill. It’s a highly competitive market. People are competing.”
Kalshi’s chief executive continued making his point in the interview, answering his own questions as a way to draw similarities between everyday events and prediction market trading. “What percentage of hedge funds outperform the S&P every year? Is it fifty-fifty? No, it’s not. It’s like 20 percent, 20 or 30. What percentage of teams win the NBA Finals every year? One. It is hard. You have to do an extensive amount of research to be good… [winning traders have] dedicated their lives to basically becoming good at it.”
Mansour also compared prediction markets to sportsbooks, claiming that roughly 96% of bettors lose in the long term due to restrictions and account bans that state-licensed apps place on professional handicappers. According to the Kalshi CEO, prediction market trades allow a much higher percentage of participants to win over an extended period of time due to the exchange’s business model, which rewards traders who spend time learning, researching, and improving.
Unlike poker sites throughout the 2010s, Kalshi’s executives appear unwilling to demonize the exchange’s most successful account holders. The fact that between 25% and 33% of individuals who use the platform come out ahead in any given year proves the point that prediction market trading is indeed a skill-based activity.
And unlike the poker lobbyist executives from a decade ago, who ultimately used their prominence to jump ship and become geofencing gurus capable of winning on both sides of the “legalization” argument, prediction market advocacy organizations have armed their followers with educational material and collaboration opportunities that have allowed prediction markets to far surpass anything online poker has been able to achieve since the early 2000s.
As long as online sportsbooks continue limiting or banning “sharp” bettors, and as long as states continue to increase the tax rates and terms on sportsbook apps, the argument that prediction markets offer more opportunities to actually “make money” will statistically hold. But as soon as prediction markets begin turning on successful traders, claims that the platforms offer true “peer-to-peer” products will correspondingly falter.
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