{"id":7110,"date":"2026-03-02T07:53:56","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T07:53:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cryptonews.uk.com\/?p=7110"},"modified":"2026-03-02T07:53:56","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T07:53:56","slug":"kalshi-faces-backlash-after-50m-market-on-khameneis-death-sparks-rule-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cryptonews.uk.com\/?p=7110","title":{"rendered":"Kalshi Faces Backlash After $50M Market on Khamenei\u2019s Death Sparks Rule Dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<div id=\"blockquote-block_b26604801be5f86345dd24ea24658006\" class=\"blockquote-container\" style=\"border-color: #5100fc\">\n<div class=\"blockquote-text\">\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Prediction markets faced heavy volume and ethical backlash following U.S.-Israeli strikes in Iran that resulted in the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kalshi drew sharp criticism for its \u201cAli Khamenei out\u201d contract, with CEO Tarek Mansour defending a settlement process that pays out based on the last-traded price prior to death to prevent profiting from mortality.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On Polymarket, Bubblemaps identified newly created wallets that netted over $1.2 million from strike-related bets, raising concerns about potential insider trading.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Prediction markets saw heavy trading (and backlash) on Saturday as news spread of U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, with bets tied to political outcomes and, indirectly, death.<\/p>\n<p>Bubblemaps said it identified several new crypto wallets linked to Polymarket that collectively made more than US$1.2 million (AU$1.84 million) from Iran strike-related markets.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">JUST IN: \ud83c\uddee\ud83c\uddf7 \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf8  Six suspected insiders made $1.2M betting on a US strike on Iran<\/p>\n<p>Most of these wallets:<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 were funded in the last 24h<br \/>\u2022 specifically bet for February 28<br \/>\u2022 bought &#8220;yes&#8221; hours before the strike <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/n3G6OIEOXt\">pic.twitter.com\/n3G6OIEOXt<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Bubblemaps (@bubblemaps) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/bubblemaps\/status\/2027718004193300791?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">February 28, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p><strong>Read more: Ripple and Franklin Templeton Back t54 Labs\u2019 $5M Bet on Agentic Finance<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-kalshi-s-controversial-khamenei-contract\">Kalshi\u2019s Controversial Khamenei contract<\/h2>\n<p>Kalshi faced the sharpest scrutiny over a contract titled \u201cAli Khamenei out as Supreme Leader?\u201d, which had been live since Jan. 9. Prediction market analyst Dustin Gouker said it has drawn more than US$50 million (AU$76.5 million) in total volume, including about US$20 million (AU$30.6 million) on Saturday alone.<\/p>\n<p>Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour said Khamenei was killed in the strikes early Saturday and defended the contract\u2019s design. \u201cWe don\u2019t list markets directly tied to death,\u201d he wrote on X, adding that Kalshi writes rules to limit profiting from death when it could affect outcomes.<\/p>\n<div id=\"blockquote-block_635e728762ed4e922bf6ffa00fff786d\" class=\"blockquote-container variant-personal\">\n<div class=\"blockquote-text\">\n<p><em>In these instances, we make the caveat clear in the rules and in the market page, but today is a good learning that we can do more in terms of improving the UX and adding more ways to surface the rules. We are committed to improving.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"blockquote-attribution\">\n        <img decoding=\"async\" class=\"author-image lazyload\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.cryptonews.com.au\/2026\/03\/02161220\/Tarek-Mansour-CEO-of-Kalshi.jpg\"\/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.cryptonews.com.au\/2026\/03\/02161220\/Tarek-Mansour-CEO-of-Kalshi.jpg\" class=\"author-image\" data-eio=\"l\"\/>        Tarek Mansour, CEO of Kalshi.    <\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Under the CFTC-filed terms, Kalshi said the market would settle at the last-traded price before Khamenei\u2019s death, rather than paying out a binary \u201cYes.\u201d Mansour said the cutoff was 1:14 a.m. ET Saturday, and that trades entered after his death would be refunded.<\/p>\n<p>The settlement drew complaints after Kalshi paused trading around 2:59 p.m. ET and closed the contract at 10:06 p.m. ET, according to DeFi Rate. Kalshi issued two clarifications, saying earlier settlement language was \u201cgrammatically ambiguous.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A key dispute was timing, as the CFTC language referenced the last price \u201cprior to the death,\u201d while the market page referenced the last price before \u201cconfirmed reporting of death,\u201d leaving a gap that covered hours of active trading.<\/p>\n<p>Criticism also targeted Kalshi\u2019s marketing because, as reports of Khamenei\u2019s death circulated, Kalshi posted that the odds he was out had surged to 68%, a post Mansour reposted. Amanda Fischer of Better Markets, a former SEC chief of staff, called it a \u201cproxy market on assassination.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Read more: Next 150 Days Make-Or-Break For Crypto, Says Swyftx Analyst Hundal<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>Iran,Kalshi,Prediction Market#Kalshi #Faces #Backlash #50M #Market #Khameneis #Death #Sparks #Rule #Dispute1772438036<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Prediction markets faced heavy volume and ethical backlash following U.S.-Israeli strikes in Iran that resulted in the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Kalshi drew sharp criticism for its \u201cAli Khamenei out\u201d contract, with CEO Tarek Mansour defending a settlement process that pays out based on the last-traded price prior to death to prevent profiting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7111,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[656,1214,2954,980,147,1384,2953,43,452,2138],"class_list":{"0":"post-7110","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bitcoin","8":"tag-50m","9":"tag-backlash","10":"tag-death","11":"tag-dispute","12":"tag-faces","13":"tag-kalshi","14":"tag-khameneis","15":"tag-market","16":"tag-rule","17":"tag-sparks"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.6 (Yoast SEO v26.6) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Kalshi Faces Backlash After $50M Market on Khamenei\u2019s Death Sparks Rule Dispute - Crypto News: Latest Cryptocurrency News and Analysis<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cryptonews.uk.com\/?p=7110\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kalshi Faces Backlash After $50M Market on Khamenei\u2019s Death Sparks Rule Dispute\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Prediction markets faced heavy volume and ethical backlash following U.S.-Israeli strikes in Iran that resulted in the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. 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