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Comment by giarc | Hacker News Reader

These prediction markets are so ripe for abuse it's unbelievable. People need to realize there are real people on the other side of these bets. Brian Armstong, CEO of Coinbase intentionally altered the outcome of a bet by randomly stating "Bitcoin, Ethereum, blockchain, staking, Web3" at the end of an earnings call. These types of bets shouldn't be allowed.

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It’s not really abuse though. These markets aggregate information; when an insider takes one side of a trade, they are selling their information about the true price (probability of the thing happening) to the market (and the price will move accordingly).

You’re spot on that people should think of who is on the other side of the trades they’re taking, and be extremely paranoid of being adversely selected.

Disallowing people from making terrible trades seems…paternalistic? Idk

You don’t get it. Allowing insiders to trade disincentivizes normal people from putting money. Why else is it not allowed in stock market?

Why should normal people be incentivized to make trades on things they probably haven’t got the slightest idea about

The point of prediction markets isn't to be fair. They are not the stock market. The point of prediction markets is to predict. They provide a monetary incentive for people who are good at predicting stuff. Whether that's due to luck, analysis, insider knowledge, or the ability to influence the result is irrelevant. If you don't want to participate in an unfair market, don't participate in prediction markets.

But what's the point of predicting how many times Elon will say "Trump" on an earnings call (or some random event Kalshi or Polymarket make up)? At least the stock market serves a purpose. People will claim "prediction markets are great for price discovery!" Ok. I'm so glad we found out the chance of Nicki Minaj saying "Bible" during some recent remarks. In case you were wondering, the chance peaked at around 45% and she did not say 'bible'! She passed up a great opportunity to buy the "yes" and make a ton of money!

https://kalshi.com/markets/kxminajmention/nicki-minaj/kxmina...

I agree that the "will [person] say [word]" markets are stupid. "Will Brian Armstrong say the word 'Bitcoin' in the Q4 earnings call" is a stupid market because nobody a actually cares whether or not he actually says 'Bitcoin', they care about whether or not Coinbase is focusing on Bitcoin. If Armstrong manipulates the market by saying the words without actually doing anything, nobody wins except Armstrong. "Will Coinbase process $10B in Bitcoin transactions in Q4" is a much better market because, though Armstrong could still manipulate the market's outcome, his manipulation would influence a result that people actually care about. The existence of stupid markets doesn't invalidate the concept.

That argument works for insider training too.

And? Insider trading is bad because it's unfair, and the stock market is supposed to be fair. Prediction markets are not fair. If you are looking for a fair market, prediction markets are not that. Insider trading is accepted and encouraged in prediction markets because it makes the predictions more accurate, which is the entire point.

The stock market isn't supposed to be fair.

By 'fair', I mean 'all parties have access to the same information'. The stock market is supposed to give everyone the same information. Trading with privileged information (insider trading), is illegal. Publicly traded companies are required to file 10-Qs and 10-Ks. SEC rule 10b5-1 prohibits trading with material non-public information. There are measures and regulations in place to try to make the stock market fair. There are, by design, zero such measures with prediction markets. Insider trading improves the accuracy of prediction markets, which is their whole purpose to begin with.

I’m pretty sure that these model release date markets are made to be abused. They’re just a way to pay insiders to tell you when the model will be released.

The mention markets are pure degenerate gambling and everyone involved knows that

Correct, and this is actually how all markets work in the sense that they allow for price discovery :)

> people need to realize there are real people on the other side of these bets

None of whom were forced by anyone to place bets in the first place.

>Brian Armstong, CEO of Coinbase intentionally altered the outcome of a bet by randomly stating "Bitcoin, Ethereum, blockchain, staking, Web3" at the end of an earnings call.

For the kind of person playing these sorts of games, that actually really "hype".

Abuse sounds bad, this is good! Now we have a sneak peek into the future, for free! Just don't bet on any markets where an insider has knowledge (or don't bet at all)

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