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17 hours ago - Business


AMERICA THE SLOT MACHINE

 * Zachary Basu
   , author of
   Axios Sneak Peek

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Illustration: Tiffany Herring/Axios

The explosion of legalized gambling has set the stage for a provocative new
frontier in the world of risk-taking — betting markets for everyday events,
ranging from Taylor Swift streams to hurricanes hitting major U.S. cities.

Why it matters: Americans' growing fixation with gambling has fueled a
multibillion-dollar sports betting industry, meme stock mania on Wall Street,
record Powerball jackpots and soaring casino spending. Prediction markets could
be the next to cash in on the phenomenon.

Zoom in: Users can bet on hundreds of real-world events — whether the Fed will
cut rates, the high temperature today in Miami, Oscar nominations, the outcome
of Supreme Court cases — on Kalshi, the only federally regulated exchange
dedicated to event markets.

 * Kalshi says its user base has grown 5x since the start of the year. Fed
   decisions and other economic data are its most popular bets.
 * Last week, the Trump-tied trading firm Susquehanna became Kalshi's first
   dedicated institutional market maker — a major milestone in the platform's
   ability to unlock consistent liquidity.

What they're saying: "The vision of the company is to take this asset class
mainstream," Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour told Axios in an interview. "I want event
contracts to be traded like a stock."

 * Insurance companies and institutional investors already get indirect access
   to event markets by bundling and hedging certain assets, Mansour said — he
   just wants to simplify and democratize the process.
 * "Kalshi is already the most accurate forecast for federal interest rates,"
   Mansour says. "That's the beauty of these markets: they do an incredible job
   at aggregating the wisdom of the crowds to forecast the future."

Screenshot via Kalshi website

The other side: Some ethics experts have raised concerns about the integrity of
betting on natural disasters and other markets tied to human suffering, as well
as those that could be subject to manipulation.

 * The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, for example, has barred Kalshi from
   allowing users to bet on election outcomes — an order that the company is
   challenging in court.

"The reality is the tsunami and the earthquake are going to hit whether there's
Kalshi or not," Mansour told Axios.


 * "So the mission of the company is, can you provide people with better tools
   to manage their lives and do something a little bit smarter about the
   tsunami?"

The big picture: The overnight ubiquity of legal gambling has "left us in this
status quo that's really ripe for some form of correction," Brett Abarbanel,
executive director of the UNLV International Gaming Institute, told Axios.

 * Sports gambling has exploded in popularity — Americans wagered a record
   $119.84 billion last year.
 * A recent study found viewers of NHL and NBA broadcasts were exposed to an
   average of 2.8 gambling-related messages per minute. In recent weeks, the
   sports world has been rocked by high-profile gambling scandals.
 * And it's not just sports: New technologies like the stock-trading platform
   Robinhood, which paid a fine this year over its use of "gamification"
   features, are capitalizing on "humans' propensity for risk," Abarbanel said.

The bottom line: There are more ways to strike gold — and to lose your shirt —
than ever before.

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GO DEEPER

 * Tina Reed
   , author of
   Axios Vitals

1 hour ago - Health


DRUG SHORTAGES REACH ALL-TIME HIGH


Data: American Society of Health-System Pharmacists; Note: Each point represents
the number of active shortages at the end of each quarter; Chart: Axios Visuals

With 323 medicines in short supply, U.S. drug shortages have risen to their
highest level since the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists began
tracking in 2001.

Why it matters: This high-water mark should energize efforts in Congress and
federal agencies to address the broken market around what are often critical
generic drugs, the organization says.

Go deeper (1 min. read)
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 * Maya Goldman
   , author of
   Axios Vitals

2 hours ago - Health


WHY A DEEP-RED STATE COULD BE ON THE VERGE OF EXPANDING MEDICAID

an illustration of a health plus shaped like an open lock

Illustration: Tiffany Herring/Axios

Mississippi, one of the country's poorest and least healthy states, could soon
become the next to expand Medicaid.

Why it matters: It's one of several GOP-dominated states that have seriously
discussed Medicaid expansion this year, a sign that opposition to the Affordable
Care Act coverage program may be softening among some holdouts 10 years after it
became available.

Go deeper (2 min. read)
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 * Alison Snyder
   , author of
   Axios Science

2 hours ago - Science


AI'S FLAWED HUMAN YARDSTICK

Illustration of Da Vinci's The Vitruvian Man with a robot instead of a man in
the diagram.

Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios

Some of the tech industry's loudest voices — most recently Elon Musk — keep
aiming for AI to become "smarter than humans," yet there isn't agreement on what
that bar is.

Why it matters: If we obsess over this fuzzy human-centric yardstick for AI's
abilities, we could miss out on promising — but decidedly non-human — ways
machines could meet actual human needs.

Go deeper (3 min. read)
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