KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Prediction markets trade 24/7, but the banking system behind them still runs on business hours, and that gap is the binding constraint for serious traders.

• When capital has to be pre-funded across multiple venues, most of it sits idle. Seni Thomas calls this "dead capital."

• EDGE Markets is building the fix: limited-use accounts and real-time money movement purpose-built for regulated gaming and prediction markets.

• The accounts are limited-use by design: funds move only into regulated venues, credit is never part of the flow, and deposit controls are available.

Prediction markets never close, but the banking system behind them still runs on business hours. For high-volume traders and market makers, that gap has quietly become the hardest problem in the space: capital that should be working sits stranded across venues, and the money often cannot move at the moment a position does. On a recent Prediction Market Movers episode, EDGE Markets founder Seni Thomas walked through the questions serious participants keep hitting, and how EDGE is building to answer them. The highlights are below.

Why does capital get "stuck" across prediction-market venues?

As trading fragments across a growing number of venues, participants have to pre-fund each exchange separately, so money that could be working ends up stranded across accounts. Seni calls it dead capital:

"If I have a million dollars of trade on Kalshi but now I have to trade across five venues and put two hundred thousand dollars in each one of these accounts, it's dead capital, super inefficient."

Why can't you move large sums on nights and weekends?

Traditional rails are tied to business days. An ACH transfer can take days and won't start on a weekend; a wire only moves during banking hours. Above roughly $5,000, there is often no compliant way to get money in on a night or weekend, which is exactly when positions tend to move:

"Above about $5,000, there is no way to get money in outside of banking hours today."

So how does money move in real time?

Real-time payment rails clear in seconds and settle around the clock, so a deposit can land on a Saturday night or a holiday as easily as a Tuesday afternoon, at up to $5 million per transaction and $50 million per day, well above typical debit-card caps. That is what lets a trader fund a large position the moment the market moves, without a wire and without waiting for the next business day.

How is fast, high-limit money movement still compliant?

What makes it bankable is that the account is deliberately narrow. Funds can move only into other regulated, KYC- and AML-compliant venues, not general spending, which turns transactions a bank would normally flag into something both compliant and fast. As Seni describes it, every EDGE account is limited-use by design: it can fund regulated venues, but try to use it for an everyday purchase, like buying a beer at the same casino, and the transaction is declined. That narrowness is the point.

What comes after pre-funding? Post-execution settlement.

That is the direction EDGE is building toward: acting as a custodian within the NFA/CFTC framework, with real-time position netting and post-execution settlement across venues, so positions are netted and settled after they are executed rather than pre-funded up front. The relevant licenses are pending.

"...actually be a true custodian, kind of within the NFA/CFTC framework... we can actually do real-time position netting and post-execution settlement... you actually don't need to leave capital anywhere."

How big is this market, really?

Where analysts commonly cite Bernstein's projection of roughly $1 trillion by 2030, EDGE's own read is larger once cross-venue trading volume is counted:

"Everyone loves to kind of cite this one trillion by 2030 by Bernstein. We think it's closer to five to six trillion."

The $1 trillion figure is Bernstein's. The $5 to 6 trillion figure is EDGE's own projection.