Nearly All Volume on FIFA-Linked Prediction Market Is Circular Trading — WSJ
By Caitlin Ostroff and Katherine LongADI Predictstreet, a newcomer to prediction markets, made a high-profile debut during World Cup broadcasts after paying FIFA more than $150 million to become the global soccer organization's official partner.Since late August, nearly every transaction on the platform has been made by a small network of linked accounts, according to an analysis of public data, suggesting that most of its trading volume is inauthentic.About $108 million of the total $167 million in transactions that have been made on ADI Predictstreet through late September were made by cryptocurrency wallets that appear to be linked to the company, the data shows.The accounts have almost exclusively traded with one another and are funded by a single cryptocurrency wallet that also collects the platform's trading fees, the data shows. Typically, trading fees are collected by wallets associated with a platform's owner.ADI Predictstreet launched in April as part of a conglomerate led by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a member of Abu Dhabi's royal family known as the "spy sheikh," who serves as Abu Dhabi's deputy ruler and national security adviser for the United Arab Emirates. The company's deal with FIFA gave it exclusive advertising rights during 2026 World Cup matches. ADI Predictstreet aims to be "the world's leading prediction market platform, with millions of active users," according to the FIFA Museum's website.ADI Predictstreet didn't respond to requests for comment. FIFA declined to comment.The unusual trading patterns were identified by three Harvard University students — Joshua Gupta, William Thompson and Ashwin Vinod Kumar — who analyzed public blockchain data. The Wall Street Journal shared the students' analysis with experts who study unusual trading activity in cryptocurrency markets. These experts concluded that trading on the platform appeared to be inorganic."In this case, it looks like some of the trading fees are getting recycled back into the wallets doing the trading, and the only people who would have access to these funds are the platform themself," said Rajiv Sethi, an economics professor at Barnard College. Crypto-tracking company Solidus Labs also verified the students' analysis.Unusual trading began on the platform during the World Cup in early July. Two cryptocurrency wallets traded more than $81 million with each other across hundreds of different markets, some days amounting to more than 90% of trading volume on the platform. Both wallets were funded by an account that also collects trading fees for ADI Predictstreet.After the World Cup, ADI Predictstreet's trading volume dropped significantly. Overall, roughly 26,000 wallets have ever traded on the platform, the data shows. But since late August, a network of 795 wallets — again all funded by the fee-collecting account — have accounted for 99% of the activity on the platform, the analysis showed."The retail activity looks almost dead," said Andre Guettler, a finance professor at Germany's Ulm University.By late September, the most hotly traded market on ADI Predictstreet's platform was whether Democrat Ron Nirenberg, the former mayor of San Antonio, would win his race for Bexar County judge against Republican Patrick Von Dohlen. More than $650,000 appears to have been bet for or against Nirenberg, who the platform shows trading at 94% odds.Every single trade in that market was made by one of the 795 company-linked wallets, the data shows, which traded among one another for roughly 10 days in September. The market has seen no trading since.Nirenberg said in an interview that he hadn't previously heard of ADI Predictstreet. In general, prediction markets on elections worry him, he said. "My instinct says it's not helpful to our democracy." Von Dohlen echoed those sentiments, adding that he believes his odds are significantly better than the platform predicts. "It certainly is very problematic to have outside and foreign influence in United States elections," he said.By comparison, combined trading volume on the much larger prediction markets Polymarket and Kalshi was less than $55,000 on the Bexar County contest as of Friday.ADI Predictstreet is licensed by the gambling division of Gibraltar, which has embraced the moniker "Blockchain Rock" in trumpeting its openness to the crypto industry. In an interview Wednesday, Andrew Lyman, Gibraltar's gambling commissioner, said a preliminary review of the trading patterns surfaced by the Journal found ADI is in compliance with Gibraltar's regulations, which prohibit "self-trading.""There has been no consumer detriment," Lyman said.On Tuesday, after the Journal began asking Gibraltar's gambling division about Predictstreet, the ADI Foundation, Predictstreet's sister nonprofit, signed a memorandum with Gibraltar pledging to work with the territory on promoting cryptocurrencies.ADI Predictstreet is listed in a June public filing as a subsidiary of the investment firm International Holding Company, whose chairman is Tahnoon. A company backed by Tahnoon also owns 49% of World Liberty Financial, the Trump family's crypto venture, the Journal previously reported.Shruti Choudhury, a spokeswoman for the investment firm, said it is "IHC's position that ADI Predictstreet is not a subsidiary of IHC." Choudhury didn't respond to additional questions.Since last year, the ADI Foundation has also signed partnerships with companies including Visa, Mastercard, BlackRock, Franklin Templeton and Bank of New York Mellon to popularize the cryptocurrency blockchain on which the prediction market is based.In late 2025, Ajay Bhatia, chief executive of ADI's parent company, agreed to pay about $170,000 to settle insider-trading allegations with India's securities regulator, pertaining to information he allegedly shared while CEO of another Tahnoon-backed company. Bhatia didn't respond to requests for comment.Write to Caitlin Ostroff at [email protected] and Katherine Long at [email protected]