Overview
What prediction markets are, how their prices and order books work, and how much to trust them.
These guides explain what prediction markets are, how their prices are made and read, and how accurate those prices turn out to be. They move from the basics of the instrument, through the mechanics of trading, to how far the price can be trusted.
Fundamentals
These guides cover the basics: what a prediction market is, the contract underneath it, where these markets trade, and how the whole idea came about.
Core Concepts
What a prediction market is, how it works, and how it compares with sports betting and investing.
Event Contracts
The instrument itself, from its two fixed payoffs to how its price reads as a probability.
Venue Types
Where event contracts trade, and how each venue handles custody, settlement, and resolution.
History of Prediction Markets
How these markets evolved from Gilded Age Wall Street to today's regulated exchanges.
Market Mechanics
These guides explain how a price becomes a probability, where that price comes from, how to read it, and how a market settles once the outcome is known.
Prices and Probabilities
How a contract price converts to a probability, and where the two come apart.
Order Books
How bids, asks, spread, and depth set a price when no bookmaker does.
Reading a Market
How to read a live market's price, spread, and depth before taking a position.
Market Resolution
How a market settles a real-world outcome, and what happens when the result is disputed.
Accuracy & Trust
These guides answer how much the price can be trusted: how accuracy is measured, how markets compare with polls and sportsbooks, and whether prices can be manipulated.
Market Accuracy
Why accuracy is measured across many prices and outcomes, not any single call.
Markets vs. Polls
How markets and polls differ, which tends to be more accurate, and when to trust each.
Markets vs. Sportsbooks
How a prediction market differs from a sportsbook, from who sets the price to how winners are treated.
Market Manipulation
Why manipulated prices tend to revert, and why resolution is the more exposed layer.