688. When Is a Bet Not a Bet?

When it comes to prediction markets, there are a lot of questions. Last week in part one of this two-part series, we asked a big question right in the headline. Are prediction markets the best forecasting tool ever? Or just another casino.

In today's episode we have more questions, like when is a bet not a bet? Or, more precisely, when is a prediction market bet gambling, in which case it would typically fall under state regulation, and when is it a trade on an event contract, which is regulated by the federal government? These are really great questions and I really enjoy talking about these questions. That is Tarek Mansor, who co-founded and is CEO of Calci, the biggest prediction market in the US. As for these thorny questions about prediction markets, I like to think of them as risks rather than downsides.

Like AI comes with a bunch of risks, and we know that there's risk of online addiction, a lot of people kind of having mental health issues because of AI, and there's job displacement. New technologies come with a series of risks. I come with the view that thinking critically about these risks and embracing regulation ahead of time upfront actually is an enabler of growth. That at least is the path that Calci has taken, collaborating with federal regulators to create a new kind of financial platform.

We already have this episode, so unlocking it is cheap and permanent: the full transcript (51 minutes, 8,885 words), segment and word-level timestamps, and .txt, .srt, .vtt and word-level JSON downloads, as many times as you like, forever.

No account needed, we create one from your checkout email. With credits it is 1 credit; packs start at 10 episodes for $5, and monthly plans are cheaper still.