Kalshi had its first $2 billion volume day Saturday, as World Cup quarterfinals and a high-profile UFC fight led to big losses for parlay takers.
The combination of England-Norway and Argentina-Switzerland at the World Cup and the UFC fight between Max Holloway and Conor McGregor led to the new high in volume. The two soccer matches both going to extra time helped ensure higher volume on both. The flagship market on all three events topped $99 million in volume, with much more on prop bets and parlays.
Kalshi’s first $2 billion day came less than a month after its first $1 billion day, in a clear sign of how quickly the platform has grown during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It is Kalshi’s 12th record-setting day for volume since the tournament began. Daily volume has averaged close to $1.5 billion in recent weeks.
Parlays play big role
Breaking it down by category, parlays played a very big role with more than $800 million in volume. Volume on parlays can arguably be misleading, as only a small portion comes from retail users, while most market makers — who put up a larger share of the volume — tend to be professional or institutional traders.
Total volume from “takers” across all categories was still a record high, however, topping $600 million for the first time. Taker volume on parlays was $58.7 million.
Those parlay takers — who tend to be real customers rather than professional market makers — largely failed to see their bets hit. They lost $23.7 million on a single day of parlays, or more than 40% of their stakes. By total amount lost, it was the third-worst day for parlay takers in Kalshi’s history.
Two parlays involving the McGregor fight became Kalshi’s most popular parlays in history by number of trades, the first two to ever have more than 50,000 different trades. A different trade often corresponds to a different user placing the trade, though not always as sometimes single transactions can be broken up into multiple trades. Both involved a McGregor “yes” leg, so with Holloway winning, neither hit.
Record for Kalshi fee revenue
Kalshi also set a new record for single-day fee revenue, at $17.2 million. If that was achieved every day for a full year, it would equate to $6.28 billion in annual revenue, or more than DraftKings’ 2025 revenue.
In the two days since, with no World Cup action, Kalshi’s volume has been notably lower, and back below the $1 billion mark. But even Monday’s $778 million in volume would have been Kalshi’s third-highest-volume day ever before the World Cup kicked off, showing how much the platform has grown.
