DraftKings has signed an agreement with Crypto.com | Derivatives North America to expand the prediction markets available on DraftKings Predictions, adding new sports offerings and setting the stage for additional contract categories including politics, BucketWire has learned.
The company said the expansion marks the first time DraftKings Predictions will offer player-specific sports event contracts for both the National Football League and the National Basketball Association. DraftKings also said the partnership broadens its menu of sports prediction markets and establishes a foundation for future categories beyond sports.
The announcement is the latest step in DraftKings’ push to build DraftKings Predictions into a standalone product that sits alongside its core sportsbook and iGaming business, giving the company a new way to engage users through event contracts tied to outcomes across sports and financial markets.
What DraftKings Announced
DraftKings said it will broaden the prediction markets offered on DraftKings Predictions through an agreement with Crypto.com | Derivatives North America, a CFTC-regulated derivatives exchange operated by Crypto.com.
The partnership will expand DraftKings Predictions in three ways.
First, DraftKings said it will introduce player-specific event contracts for the NFL and NBA on the platform. While DraftKings did not specify the exact contract types in its announcement, player-specific contracts typically include markets tied to individual performance outcomes, such as passing yards, touchdowns, points, rebounds, assists, or other statistical thresholds.
Second, DraftKings said the partnership expands the breadth of sports prediction markets available on the platform in states where DraftKings Predictions is currently offered. DraftKings said those markets will now span soccer, mixed martial arts, golf, boxing, tennis, and the Olympic Games, adding to its existing sports and financial markets.
Third, DraftKings said Crypto.com is expected to support the introduction of new event contract categories beyond sports, including culture, entertainment, and politics.
DraftKings also said it will integrate Railbird Exchange into DraftKings Predictions in the coming months.
Why Crypto.com Matters Here
Crypto.com’s involvement signals that DraftKings is building DraftKings Predictions as a multi-exchange product rather than relying on a single source of event contracts.
DraftKings said its existing financial markets on DraftKings Predictions are provided by CME Group. The addition of Crypto.com’s derivatives exchange gives DraftKings another pipeline of regulated contracts, particularly across sports and other categories where Crypto.com has been developing its own prediction-style offerings.
Crypto.com also brings a different brand footprint to the table. While DraftKings is primarily known as a sports betting and fantasy sports operator, Crypto.com is one of the most recognizable global consumer brands in cryptocurrency. That brand recognition may help normalize event contract trading for users who already associate the crypto sector with trading interfaces, price discovery, and short-duration speculation.
At the same time, DraftKings’ distribution is what Crypto.com is buying into. DraftKings is one of the largest sports betting operators in the United States, with a national customer base built through daily fantasy sports and sportsbook adoption. Crypto.com’s partnership gives it access to that audience inside a product designed around consumer simplicity rather than institutional derivatives trading.
The Player-Specific Contract Angle
The introduction of player-specific event contracts is one of the most strategically important elements of DraftKings’ announcement, because it directly overlaps with the core demand engine of modern sports betting.
In U.S. sports betting, player prop markets have become one of the highest-engagement formats across football and basketball. They are heavily consumed on mobile, driven by social conversation, and supported by a constant stream of player news, injury updates, and statistical tracking.
By bringing player-specific outcomes into DraftKings Predictions, DraftKings is moving the product closer to the experience many sportsbook users already know. That matters because prediction market platforms have historically been strongest on binary, high-salience events—elections, macroeconomic releases, championship outcomes—rather than the dense, high-frequency market structure that makes sportsbooks sticky.
Player-specific contracts change that equation.
They create a daily cadence. They also create repeatable markets where the same user can engage multiple times per week. Football and basketball in particular offer the kind of steady schedule and high-volume data environment that supports repeated trading behavior.
If DraftKings Predictions can successfully deliver a player-specific experience that feels as intuitive as sportsbook props, the platform becomes less of a curiosity product and more of a meaningful second lane for DraftKings’ customer engagement.
A Broader Sports Menu
DraftKings said the expansion adds sports prediction markets spanning soccer, mixed martial arts, golf, boxing, tennis, and the Olympic Games.
This is a notable shift because prediction-style products tend to start with a small number of headline sports. DraftKings is signaling it wants DraftKings Predictions to look and feel like a broad sports platform rather than a narrow event-contract novelty.
That breadth also mirrors how DraftKings has historically grown its sportsbook product. DraftKings’ strength has not been in owning a single sport. It has been in building a wide menu that keeps users active across seasons and off-seasons.
Sports like golf, tennis, and MMA can be particularly valuable in this context because they generate regular events outside the NFL calendar. Boxing, soccer, and Olympic markets add international and cultural moments that can drive spikes in engagement when major events occur.
The expansion also suggests DraftKings is positioning DraftKings Predictions as a year-round product, not a seasonal companion.
What DraftKings Said About the Strategy
Jeanine Hightower-Sellitto, senior vice president and general manager of DraftKings Predictions, framed the partnership as part of DraftKings’ broader momentum-building effort behind the platform.
“We’re continuing to build momentum behind DraftKings Predictions by leveraging our expertise across sports and technology and integrating additional CFTC-regulated exchanges like Crypto.com,” Hightower-Sellitto said in a statement.
She said the collaboration expands customer access to sports and broader prediction markets and reinforces DraftKings’ focus on delivering a more comprehensive experience as the product evolves.
DraftKings’ emphasis on “integrating additional exchanges” is an important detail. It implies DraftKings Predictions is being designed as a distribution layer where multiple exchanges can supply contract markets, rather than a single-exchange product.
That model is closer to how consumer brokerages operate than how sportsbooks traditionally operate.
Crypto.com’s Distribution Play
Travis McGhee, global head of Predictions at Crypto.com, framed the partnership as a major distribution milestone.
“Connecting with DraftKings, a household name in sports, is an important milestone for us because it allows us to not only expand access to prediction markets in sports, but it grows our distribution to prediction markets on cryptocurrencies, financials, companies, politics, culture, entertainment and beyond,” McGhee said.
His statement points to an ambition that extends beyond sports. Crypto.com is using this partnership to position itself as a provider of prediction market contracts across categories that resemble a hybrid of sports betting and retail trading.
The mention of “companies” is also notable. Event contracts tied to corporate outcomes, stock-related events, or company performance have been one of the areas of experimentation in broader event markets.
DraftKings did not detail whether “companies” would be a near-term offering on DraftKings Predictions. But the fact that Crypto.com raised it suggests the platform sees those categories as part of the product roadmap.
The CME + Crypto.com Combination
DraftKings said its existing sports and financial markets are provided by CME Group, and the Crypto.com agreement expands the product’s menu.
That combination matters because it positions DraftKings Predictions as a platform that can blend traditional financial benchmarks with sports.
CME is one of the most established names in derivatives markets globally. DraftKings’ relationship with CME gives the product a baseline of financial credibility and a pipeline of contracts tied to major economic and market indicators.
Crypto.com adds a different set of capabilities and brand associations. It is positioned closer to the consumer trading world, and it has a product culture built around fast-moving markets, high-frequency engagement, and retail participation.
For DraftKings, that combination supports a strategy of building DraftKings Predictions into a product that can live between sports betting and retail trading.
That middle ground is where a lot of industry experimentation is happening right now.
Railbird Exchange Integration
DraftKings also said DraftKings Predictions will integrate Railbird Exchange in the coming months.
DraftKings has previously positioned Railbird as part of its long-term prediction market strategy. Integrating Railbird suggests DraftKings is continuing to invest in the infrastructure side of its event contract ambitions, not only distribution partnerships.
DraftKings did not provide additional detail in the announcement about what the Railbird integration will change for customers or how it will interact with CME and Crypto.com markets.
But the inclusion of Railbird in the release is a clear signal that DraftKings sees DraftKings Predictions as a multi-year product build, not a short-term experiment.
Where DraftKings Predictions Is Available
DraftKings said DraftKings Predictions allows eligible customers to make predictions through federally regulated event contracts, including sports event contracts in states such as California, Florida, Georgia, and Texas.
Those state examples are notable because they include several of the largest U.S. sports betting markets that do not currently have widespread online sports betting availability in the same way as mature legal states.
DraftKings did not provide an updated full list of states in its announcement, but the mention of those four markets highlights a key strategic advantage of a standalone event-contract platform: it can reach customers in states where DraftKings’ sportsbook product is limited or not available.
That expands DraftKings’ total addressable market in the United States and gives the company a way to acquire and engage customers in large states before sportsbook legalization.
Responsible Trading Tools
DraftKings said DraftKings Predictions integrates its Responsible Trading program with tools and resources available directly within the standalone app and on its DraftKings Predictions site.
The company did not list the full set of tools in the announcement, but responsible trading programs typically include deposit limits, alerts, educational resources, and self-exclusion options.
DraftKings has increasingly emphasized consumer protection tools across its products, particularly as the industry has moved toward more scrutiny of promotional practices and user safeguards. DraftKings is positioning DraftKings Predictions as part of that broader ecosystem rather than a separate, lightly governed trading product.
What This Says About DraftKings’ Product Direction
DraftKings’ announcement provides a clearer picture of how the company is thinking about the future of prediction markets inside its business.
DraftKings is not building DraftKings Predictions as a single-category app. It is building it as a broad contract platform with multiple suppliers, multiple sports, and multiple future categories.
That matters because prediction markets, as a consumer product, still face a user education challenge. Many customers understand sportsbook odds immediately. Many customers do not understand how event contracts work until they use them.
DraftKings is addressing that challenge by pulling the product closer to what sportsbook users already understand: player-specific markets, a wide sports menu, and familiar mobile UX.
It is also building a product that can survive outside the sports calendar by adding categories like culture and entertainment and setting the stage for politics.
In other words, DraftKings is trying to build a daily habit product, not a seasonal sports companion.
Competitive Context
DraftKings is not the only major sports betting company pushing into event contracts.
FanDuel and CME Group recently announced FanDuel Predicts, a separate event-based trading platform launching in five states with a phased rollout planned through early 2026. Like DraftKings Predictions, FanDuel Predicts is positioned as a standalone app that blends financial and sports event markets.
Standalone prediction market platforms such as Kalshi and Polymarket have also expanded rapidly, broadening the categories of outcomes users can trade and driving more attention toward event-based markets as a mainstream consumer product format.
DraftKings’ differentiator is distribution and sports DNA. It is already one of the largest sports betting brands in the country, and it has years of experience building consumer engagement around sports outcomes.
The question is whether DraftKings Predictions becomes a true second pillar of the company’s ecosystem—or remains a complementary product used by a narrower segment of customers.
Our Take
DraftKings is making a clear bet that event contracts can become a mainstream consumer product, and the Crypto.com partnership is a meaningful step in that strategy.
The player-specific NFL and NBA contracts are the headline here. They move DraftKings Predictions closer to the highest-engagement format in modern sports wagering and give the platform a path toward repeat usage rather than occasional novelty trading.
The bigger story is how DraftKings is building the platform structurally. This is not a one-exchange product. DraftKings is assembling a multi-supplier prediction market stack—CME for financial benchmarks, Crypto.com for expanded categories, and Railbird for deeper integration in the months ahead.
