Introduction
Prediction markets compress dispersed beliefs and information into a single price. After the 2024 U.S. presidential election, blockchain-based prediction markets emerged as more than betting venues: they became real-time information infrastructure for uncertain events.
Yet the process that makes prices accurate is not the same as the process that distributes profits. Information may be widely dispersed while durable advantages in speed, capital, and analysis concentrate returns among a small group. The crowd can produce better probabilities even as a few participants capture most of the rewards.
This report traces the trading structure and distribution of profits in prediction markets to examine how informational advantages form and decay. It also asks how legitimate analytical skill can be distinguished from insider information, manipulation, and rent seeking.
Protecting the public value of prediction markets requires careful market-listing standards, limits on insider trading, transparent oracle-dispute procedures, and separate safeguards for sensitive events and markets involving public officials. Prediction markets can become trustworthy information institutions only when fair participation is designed alongside accurate prices.
Read the full report (Korean PDF)
