There is a moment that truly deserves to be paused. At the end of March, Kalshi Research hosted its first research conference in New York, and honestly, it revealed something much bigger: prediction markets are finally moving from being a marginal curiosity to a serious financial infrastructure.

The room gathered an interesting mix: academics, Wall Street executives, former politicians, seasoned traders. If you were looking for proof that this field is growing, it was right there, in that very composition. And among the voices heard, there were figures like Mondaire Jones, a former Congressman, who brought a valuable political perspective to the discussions.

What struck me is that prediction markets are no longer limited to elections or the Super Bowl. Yes, the volume of sports predictions approaches $3 billion per week, but here’s the thing: it’s actually at its lowest historical percentage of total volume. Other categories are exploding. Entertainment, crypto, politics, culture—all of these generate much faster user growth and stable retention. Sports has become an entry product—intuitive and emotional—but the real gains are happening elsewhere.

Long-tail markets account for over 20% of the volume, and that’s where the future is being shaped. Why? Because Wall Street is starting to understand something fundamental: these markets provide a real-time price reference for events that never had one before. Previously, if you wanted to hedge against a political or macroeconomic change, you had to make two simultaneous judgments, which was complicated. Now, you have a direct price. That’s huge.

Institutions are just beginning to adopt this. Goldman Sachs tracks macroeconomic predictions and CPI. Bloomberg uses them as narrative tools. Tradeweb even envisions major banks creating dedicated departments for prediction markets. But we’re still in the early stages—mainly data integration. Some institutions are exploring system integration, and only a few are actually trading.

The main obstacle? The current model requires full collateral. If you want a $100 position, you must lock in $100. For individuals, that’s manageable, but for hedge funds that rely on leverage, it’s a non-starter. Kalshi is working with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to introduce a leveraged trading mechanism. Once that’s in place, everything changes.

Mondaire Jones also mentioned that leaders from both political parties are starting to publicly cite Kalshi’s odds. Trump, Jeffries, Schumer—all consult this data. Two years ago, Kalshi’s top traders were seen as amateurs. Today, it’s different. These people don’t come from traditional finance; they come from poker, music, politics—but they master their respective fields, and the platform rewards that expertise.

The real question now isn’t whether prediction markets will become mainstream, but how they will be integrated. Michael McDonough from Bloomberg said it well: true success is when it becomes boring. Like options in the 1970s, it will just become an infrastructure we take for granted.

In a few years, maybe less, we won’t be asking whether to use prediction markets but how to use them most effectively. And Mondaire Jones, like many others, already understands: it’s a tool that’s becoming essential for understanding and navigating political and economic uncertainty. It’s already starting to normalize, and this is just the beginning.