Reporter at the @WSJ, via @businessinsider @seattletimes. katherine.long@wsj.com Send me tips on Signal from a non-work device: longka.38
New York
- Tweets 691
- Following 2,397
- Followers 10,935
- Likes 22,204
Katherine Long retweeted
"Christos Marafatsos has attended so many of her meetings that some foreign officials mistook him for her chief of staff. In fact, he is a top lobbyist for Aktor, whose CEO had flown Guilfoyle to the country on a private jet." wsj.com/articles/kimberly-gu…
1
8
22
11,978
Katherine Long retweeted
Scoop from @amacker & @kjspeaks truth:
The FDIC just learned about Polymarket's contracts on potential bank failures and...isn't best pleased. On @theterminal now.
7
51
213
106,951
Katherine Long retweeted
"The room gave off a musty smell—one familiar to anyone who has ever entered a Russian bureaucratic building. On the wall hung a poster of a smirking Putin in a suit and sunglasses along with the word 'Svoy,' meaning: One of our own. Through the window I could see the glowing white and red lights of a KFC," writes WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich.
"The man in the suit, an investigator, in Russian law enforcement parlance, calmly told me he was charging me with espionage, a crime that carries a sentence of up to 20 years in prison. 'Do you understand what that means?' he asked.
"I nodded. An odd sense of relief flooded through me. It's a feeling I've been trying to understand ever since.
"'If there's anything you'd like to say,' the investigator continued, 'now would be a good time.'
"I asked again to see the Journal's lawyers. The investigator got up and left me waiting with the agent and another who joined him. The agent who had checked my biography and I started talking. He seemed eager for the chance to speak with an American, especially one he believed to be a spy. I was curious to talk to an FSB agent—and to distract myself from thinking about what would come next.
"He asked questions about life back home, complained that it took too long for the U.S. to come to the Soviet Union's aid in World War II, and asked whether I thought Ukraine could mount a successful counteroffensive against Russia's invading forces in the current war. Much of our conversation on that night in late March 2023 has been lost to the fog of shock, but one moment remains with me with absolute clarity.
"'You can't step in the same river twice,' the agent told me deep into the night, as we were preparing to part. 'Your life will be completely different now.'"
Read the exclusive excerpt from WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich's new book: 🔗 on.wsj.com/4AMGmNI
20
120
343
137,232
NEW from @KevinTDugan: New York, one of the largest markets for gambling in the U.S., escalated its fight against prediction markets Thursday by suing Polymarket’s domestic arm, alleging that the bet-on-nearly-everything site was illegally running a gambling operation. wsj.com/us-news/law/ny-sues-…
4
19
43
7,767
Katherine Long retweeted
Incredible reporting from Lilith. For the first time a lot of the shady gambling operators in Curacao can now be unmasked.
Starting today, you can investigate for yourself who owns and operates casinos in Curaçao. I’ve just released part of the data from the Curaçao Gaming Authority.
casinosecrets.lol/
41
156
3,141
226,296
We wrote in February about the risks of such markets, including interviewing one trader who initially claimed he’d tried to manipulate a market on a Trump speech, before walking that back.
We don’t permit contracts that are readily susceptible to manipulation to be listed on @CFTC registered exchanges.
Just yesterday, CFTC staff clarified their views on the listing of mention markets, which raise unique manipulation risks. We’ll continue to hold offerings on our exchanges to the highest standard.
2
3
22
3,883
A few days ago, we published a story about Polymarket's headlong rush to growth. One part of the story was especially interesting to me: Polymarket's relationship with Drake.
Last fall, Polymarket was in talks with Drake about an agreement in the tens of millions of dollars, according to people familiar with the talks.
Spokespeople for Polymarket and Drake said the parties didn’t sign a deal. The musician subsequently name-dropped both Polymarket and Coplan in his album “Iceman.”
Coplan attended Drake’s private album-release party at a castlelike mansion in Toronto, where he posed in a photo with former NBA player Tristan Thompson.
In late April, Polymarket opened a market on whether Drake would say “Polymarket” on the album, one of many markets it launched related to that album. A single trader, whose account was created shortly before the album dropped and bet only on album-related markets, cashed out $7,800 in bets that he would. Hours before the album release, Drake’s team played it for Polymarket employees, who heard the mention of the company and deleted the market out of concern that it presented an insider-trading risk, according to data reviewed by the Journal and a person familiar with the matter.
4
16
83
15,726
Gift link to our story: wsj.com/business/polymarkets…
5
770
Additional research on Kalshi perps volume.
"The evidence is consistent with volume that exists because it is costless to produce rather than because it serves a trading purpose."
Kalshi perps volume debate: what happened when exchange fees switched on
On 8 June Kalshi filed its first perpetual fee schedule (takers 12.0–2.6 bps, makers 5.0–0.6 bps), effective 24 June at 10:00 ET. A "Temporary Perpetual Fee Rebate Program" returning all net fees to self-clearing members was filed the same week, but its stated effective date was 9 July, retroactive to the filing. For roughly 40 hours from 24 June, market participants therefore faced the full schedule with no rebate in force.
Within hours of the fee going live, venue-wide volume fell 80–92%. Over 25 June the BTC and ETH contracts traded $23m and $21m, against $296m and $109m on 23 June, and were close to dormant in the quietest hours. This was not a market-wide lull. Binance BTC+ETH volume sat near its June high on 24–25 June, so Kalshi's volume expressed as a share of Binance, which nets out any common movement, fell by more than a factor of ten.
Volume then resumed abruptly around 08:00 UTC on 26 June and exceeded pre-event levels. Fixed-ticket volume was three to five times its 23 June level, and the ETH ticket doubled from $5,000 to $10,000, holding 69–75% of ETH volume over the following days.
Link to a first working paper version with more deeps dives is in the comments.
2
6
21
3,758
Katherine Long retweeted
SCOOP with @ByKLong @ceostroff:
- The CFTC is examining unusual Kalshi trades with near-identical sizes that now total over $5B
- Prop-trading firms Jump Trading (a Kalshi shareholder) and Wintermute were two of the parties involved in the transactions
We analyzed months of Kalshi data. The trades, all clustered near $5,500, began in late August (see chart).
18
30
191
71,581
this is great and long overdue
markets like mentions are so obviously net negative for the prediction markets industry. at some point we are just asking for trouble. let’s not!
4
3
41
9,001
NEW w/ @ceostroff @byneilmehta: The CFTC is examining unusual Kalshi trades first surfaced here by @beniduboss. Since August, almost one million trades were made in a single market in nearly identical amounts.
wsj.com/finance/currencies/5…
4
14
128
37,659
Katherine Long retweeted
A new CFTC advisory says mention markets "present a heightened risk of manipulation."
Importantly, the note "is not intended to, does not, and may not be relied upon to create any rights, substantive or procedural, enforceable by law by any party in any matter."
2
2
12
9,413
There is no reason for a serious institution to even offer odds on a LeBron James presidency, much less for there to be more than $40 million in trading volume
SCOOP: 70% of trading volume on Polymarket's 2028 presidential election market is on candidates with <1% chance of winning.
$48 million has been traded on a LeBron James presidency, and only $9 million on Marco Rubio. $34 million on Kim Kardashian.
There's a combined $41 million in trades on Elon Musk and Zohran Mamdani—both of whom, as non-native U.S. citizens, are ineligible for inauguration.
The trend is reversed on Kalshi, where trading volume is concentrated among the front-runners.
2
2
18
3,957
Katherine Long retweeted
Easily the best in-depth/investigative reporting on prediction markets coming from the folks at WSJ.
NEW: A story full of scoops big and small from @ceostroff and @byneilmehta.
> Polymarket removed one of its anti-money-laundering programs during a fraud attack, alarming some staff; CEO Shayne Coplan downplayed risks
> Persistent engineering glitches have cost some customers thousands
> Internal audio & text messages reveal Coplan’s management style
> Some current & former employees & investors are concerned Poly has prioritized growth at all costs
> Company is trying to course-correct; eyeing an IPO by the end of 2027
> Talks with Drake fell through; rapper name-dropped Poly in a song anyways; a market on the album saw suspicious trading
And more. Gift link below.
wsj.com/business/polymarkets…
2
4
52
14,986
Katherine Long retweeted
Also in Don Jr.'s entourage: Shayne Coplan, the CEO of Polymarket.
11
51
2,410
Katherine Long retweeted
Wall Street Journal
- @Polymarket story has a similar vibe to the @NYTimes piece on @DraftKings using AI
Current or former employees complaining about their boss anonymously should weighed accordingly
The customer experiences here carry more impact
wsj.com/business/polymarkets…
1
8
945
“Coplan has pushed employees to create provocative new markets. In text messages reviewed by the Journal, he suggested markets on ‘How many times does kanye say Jew on X this week’ and ‘Elon calls someone new a retard.’”
NEW: A story full of scoops big and small from @ceostroff and @byneilmehta.
> Polymarket removed one of its anti-money-laundering programs during a fraud attack, alarming some staff; CEO Shayne Coplan downplayed risks
> Persistent engineering glitches have cost some customers thousands
> Internal audio & text messages reveal Coplan’s management style
> Some current & former employees & investors are concerned Poly has prioritized growth at all costs
> Company is trying to course-correct; eyeing an IPO by the end of 2027
> Talks with Drake fell through; rapper name-dropped Poly in a song anyways; a market on the album saw suspicious trading
And more. Gift link below.
wsj.com/business/polymarkets…
2
1
624