New York Stock Exchange owner takes $2B stake in Polymarket, valuing betting platform at $8B

The owner of the New York Stock Exchange is investing up to $2 billion in the fast-growing betting platform Polymarket — a surprise megadeal that comes less than a year after FBI agents raided the Manhattan apartment of the firm’s shaggy-haired, 27-year-old founder.

Tuesday’s investment by NYSE owner Intercontinental Exchange — known on Wall Street as ICE — values Polymarket, which has enabled users to bet on everything from sports to elections to the length of the government shutdown, at around $8 billion.

The deal marks a marriage of ICE, an old-guard giant with a market value of more than $90 billion — with a crypto-based upstart founded in 2020 that only won approval to operate in the US just last month after a series of headline-grabbing brushes with the law.

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Polymarket turned heads last year after it drew more than $2 billion in trading volume during the 2024 presidential election — and accurately predicted President Trump’s victory.

Just days after the election, FBI agents raided Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan’s Soho apartment — stirring the young entrepreneur from bed and seizing his phone, The Post exclusively reported last year.

The shocking predawn raid was part of a criminal probe into whether the startup had accepted bets from US users – which would have violated a deal the firm made with the Biden administration, sources told The Post.

Polymarket seems to have mended its relationship with US authorities under the crypto-friendly Trump administration.

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In July, Coplan posted a Bloomberg article on social media that said the government probes into Polymarket were over, writing: “Justice prevailed.”

“Our partnership with ICE marks a major step in bringing prediction markets into the financial mainstream,” Coplan said in a Tuesday statement.

“By combining ICE’s institutional scale and credibility with Polymarket’s consumer savvy, we will be able to deliver world-class products for the modern investor,” he added.

Under the deal, ICE will become a global distributor of Polymarket’s event-driven data, and the two will partner on future “tokenization” projects that mix conventional markets with blockchain-based assets.

Shares in Intercontinental Exchange were recently up 1.7% on Tuesday afternoon.

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Polymarket, which is privately held, boasts big-name investors including Peter Thiel’s venture-capital firm, Founders Fund.

The platform lets users place bets on virtually any yes-or-no question. Those range from who will win New York City’s mayoral election and when an Israel-Hamas ceasefire will be reached to guesses about sales of Taylor Swift’s latest album.

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The betting site has also developed some personal ties to the White House, adding Donald Trump Jr., the president’s son, to its advisory board in August. 

His venture-capital firm 1789 Capital is also an investor in the prediction market.

Meanwhile, Jeffrey Sprecher – the chairman and CEO of Intercontinental Exchange – is married to Trump ally Kelly Loeffler, who currently runs the Small Business Administration. 

The deal comes as the prediction markets industry has taken off. 

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Industry-wide revenue is expected to climb to $8 billion by 2030, especially as the new platforms lean into sports bets, according to an analysis by Piper Sandler.

Polymarket rival Kalshi – which was valued at $2 billion in a recent funding round – has notched record trading volumes since introducing bets on NFL games in recent weeks.

Many of those wagers have been made by users on Robinhood Markets, which partners with Kalshi.

The gambling industry, however, is up in arms over the new NFL bets, arguing that sports betting is typically overseen by state regulators.