Polymarket’s monthly trading volume fell to $8.41 billion in August, down about 35% from July’s $12.89 billion, as the post-World Cup rush that drove prediction markets earlier this summer faded.
Rival Kalshi barely flinched, closing the month at $38.67 billion, a gap that shows how unevenly the slowdown hit the two biggest platforms in the space.
Polymarket’s Volume Cools While Kalshi Holds Steady
According to data compiled by The Block, Polymarket’s combined volume, its core platform plus the separate Polymarket US product, ran $13.95 billion in June, dipped modestly to $12.89 billion in July, then dropped to $8.41 billion in August.
The core Polymarket platform did most of the falling, sliding from $7.89 billion in July to $4.59 billion in August, while Polymarket US held up better, going from $5 billion to $3.82 billion.
Kalshi’s numbers moved in almost the opposite direction. It closed June at $33 billion, climbed to $40.1 billion in July, and only eased back to $38.67 billion in August, a drop of roughly 4%. The gap between the two platforms has widened: Kalshi now processes close to five times Polymarket’s monthly volume, based on the same figures.
DeFiLlama’s tracking shows the pullback has continued into September too, with weekly volume across the industry running around $4 billion, well below the pace platforms saw during the tournament.
A Trading Slowdown That Hasn’t Scared Off Investors
As CryptoPotato reported in July, the World Cup pushed prediction market volume from about $65 million at the beginning of that month to a peak of $5.6 billion by the 22nd, with football pulling in a wave of first-time users across multiple platforms.
That run is the high point the industry has been coming down from. But the volume drop hasn’t dented interest from investors, though, with Donald Trump Jr.’s venture capital firm, 1789 Capital, leading a $1 billion funding round that values Polymarket at $21 billion, a 40% jump from the roughly $15 billion valuation it carried earlier this year.
Data from Predictefy puts Polymarket’s 30-day volume at $3.8 billion against Kalshi’s $11.28 billion, though Polymarket still counts more than 3 million users on its platform.
Legal pressure hasn’t gone away either. Recall that Baltimore sued both Kalshi and Polymarket last month, arguing the companies are running unlicensed sports betting operations, one of several lawsuits the two platforms are juggling.
Kalshi is also fighting a lawsuit from New York Attorney General Letitia James, prompting the CFTC to invoke emergency powers to keep it running in the state, all as trading volume settles into a quieter rhythm.
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