Key Insights:
- Prediction markets represented 55% of weekly trading activity of Solana memecoins between Sept. 22-28.
- Kalshi dominated with $854.7 million in weekly volume, surpassing its November 2024 US election week peak.
- Solana memecoins registered $2.8 billion in trading volume, the smallest since early September 2024.
Prediction markets registered $1.54 billion in trading volume between Sept. 22 and 28, narrowing the gap with Solana memecoins.
The four leading prediction market platforms captured 55% of the weekly trading activity compared to memecoins on Solana, according to data shared by X user MovieTime on Sept. 29.
Solana memecoins registered $2.8 billion in trading volume for the same period, the smallest volume since early September 2024, according to Blockworks data.
Solana Memecoins In Focus as Prediction Markets Grow
Amid the Solana memecoins hype, Kalshi dominated weekly volumes with $854.7 million, its all-time high in weekly volume, according to data from DefiLlama.
The figure surpassed the previous peak of $750 million seen during the US election week of Nov. 4 and 10.
Data from DefiLlama showed that Polymarket registered $355.6 million in weekly volume, the second-best week since the last week of December 2024, bested only by the previous week of Sept. 15 and 21.
Together, Polymarket and Kalshi accounted for 78.6% of the prediction market’s weekly trading volume.
MovieTime assessed the movement:
“Truth capital markets. More capital in these markets makes it more accurate. When we get more volume, then we get bigger players. Which causes more volume. positive feedback loop. I think prediction markets are here to stay.”
Starting the week of Sept. 29 to Oct. 5, prediction markets generated more volume Solana memecoins on Sept. 29, according to data shared by Kalshi’s growth team member, ultra.
While prediction markets registered $351.7 million in daily volume, memecoins reached $277.2 million the same day.
The daily flip marked a potential inflection point in crypto trading patterns.
However, it was too early to predict that prediction markets could soon become the new destination for crypto traders, rather than memecoins, based on a single weak week for memecoin trading.
Prediction Markets Aided by Cultural Momentum Memecoins Currently Lack
The momentum of prediction markets suggested that they could compete with memecoin trading for volume.
Kalshi and Polymarket starred in a South Park episode on Sept. 24, dedicated to the theme of prediction markets. The cultural recognition reflected growing mainstream awareness of the platforms.
Prediction markets are also seen as more fundamentally grounded than memecoins, as the platforms assist with results based on verifiable outcomes rather than pure speculation.
Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, wrote a blog post in November 2024, while prediction markets were booming, fueled by the US elections, describing their importance.
He stated:
“To many people, prediction markets are about betting on elections, and betting on elections is gambling – nice if it helps people enjoy themselves, but fundamentally not more interesting than buying random coins on pump.fun.”
Buterin explained his interest in the concept:
“I believe that prediction markets even as they exist today are a very useful tool for the world, but furthermore prediction markets are only one example of a much larger incredibly powerful category, with potential to create better implementations of social media, science, news, governance, and other fields. I shall label this category’ info finance’.”
According to him, info finance is the possibility of using finance as a way to align incentives in order to provide viewers with valuable information.
The concept begins with the fact that someone wants to know something, and the query is directed to the market to elicit that information from market participants in an optimal manner.
Buterin believes that using prediction markets presents “a credibly neutral, fast, and cheap” alternative to the traditional information mechanism.
This belief, shared by one of the key figures in crypto and echoed by other important players, could provide fundamental support for prediction markets to attract more market participation in the crypto market.