Instadocs: The Prediction Games

Last weekend, more than $5.6 billion was wagered on the World Cup final using Polymarket and Kalshi. This represents just a sliver of the action on prediction markets - a legal but controversial way to gamble on the outcome of almost anything. From the World Cup and Taylor Swift's wedding to elections, weather, and armed conflict, tens of millions of people are diving into these markets - with all sorts of consequences. This installment of Instadocs drops viewers into the red-hot center of betting fever, tracking the fortunes made and lost, with interviews with those who own the game, including Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan and Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour, plus regulator Michael Selig, head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Prediction markets are a deceptively sophisticated idea, with roots far back in American history. But the allure of easy money can carry real risk: when bettors harass war reporters to publish fake news and hackers manufacture Spotify streams to win millions, has reality itself become a target for manipulation? Has the wisdom of crowds turned into mob rule?