Morning Minute: Meta Is Building a Prediction Market

GM!

Today’s top news:

Mark Zuckerberg wants in on the hottest corner of crypto-adjacent finance.

Of course, this comes at a time when seemingly everyone wants in, with both Schwab and Cboe planning their own version of a prediction market featuring S&P 500 contracts, and seemingly every major crypto exchange has one or is partnering with one.

At the same time, prediction markets are facing heat with the CME suing the CFTC over whether perps and these products are properly regulated, a Michigan court ruling sports markets fall outside federal oversight, and a Wall Street Journal probe finding $1.9 million in faked Polymarket bets.

Meta certainly has the user case to succeed. The question is–do those users want to predict within their social feeds? Or keep market and social separate? The prediction market giants will be watching closely to find out…

The way gacha works is that the company buys cards in bulk at a 5 to 15% discount, then users open packs and either keep the cards or instantly sell them back at 7 to 15% below market. This is seen as generally positive-sum, since users get packs worth slightly more than they pay on average while Collector Crypt keeps a blended margin near 5%, or about 4.4% net after incentives.

Collector Crypt has capitalized on that 4.4% net margin to the tune of a whopping $54 million in annualized profit in May, and tracking toward a $109 million run-rate in June. And they’ve done it all on a base of about 800 daily active users. At a $500M FDV (Malestrom argues it’s actually closer to $325M), Hayes thinks it’s pretty cheap.

The larger thesis is eBay disruption. Selling a Pokémon card on eBay costs 16 to 20% all-in once fees and shipping are counted, while Collector Crypt charges 2%, settles instantly, and holds the card in custody. Maelstrom’s framing is that stablecoins did this to payments and Hyperliquid did it to trading, taking a clunky web2 process and rebuilding it onchain, and Collector Crypt is doing the same for cards.

It’s a compelling pitch. And Maelstrom isn’t necessarily early here, as the CARDS token has gone up ~8x since April 1st. But there remain open questions around how the team is driving revenue back to the token, and until those are firmly answered, there will be doubters of the token. The success of Collector Crypt the protocol though, can not be argued. And it is on track to go much higher from here…

A group of 82 Catholic leaders warned that a key provision of the CLARITY Act, the market-structure bill the industry has pushed hard to pass, could enable human trafficking. The provision in question shields blockchain software developers from prosecution, and the religious leaders argue that carving out that legal protection could let bad actors build and run tools that move illicit funds without accountability.

Crypto advocates see developer protection as essential, arguing that writing neutral code shouldn’t expose engineers to criminal liability for how others use it. The Catholic leaders are attacking from a moral angle instead, casting the same provision as a loophole that could shield the infrastructure behind trafficking and exploitation. That framing is harder for politicians to wave off than a typical industry-versus-regulator dispute and gives new ammo for those opposed to waive the “human trafficking” flag as the bill debate wages on.

Moral opposition from a large faith coalition gives wavering lawmakers a reason to slow down or demand changes to the developer carve-out. It won’t sink the bill on its own, but it widens the coalition against it beyond the usual skeptics, and it forces the industry to defend one of its most cherished principles on unfamiliar ground. Odds of the Clarity Act passing in 2026 have fallen from ~75% to 43%, now an underdog to pass.