Polymarket's $2B Raise and ICE Investment

Polymarket scales with Wall Street’s blessing, Kalshi fires up KOLs, and BNB chain melts down as fast as it ran. We dissect Aster’s data drama, the new privacy wave lifting Zcash, and Galaxy One’s glossy yields—what’s smart strategy vs. old mistakes in new clothes?

Welcome to The Chopping Block — where crypto insiders Haseeb Qureshi, Tom Schmidt, Tarun Chitra, and Robert Leshner chop it up about the latest in crypto. This week, we unpack Polymarket’s jaw-dropper: a $2B raise at a $9B valuation led by ICE (parent of the NYSE), the token tease, and whether prediction markets will eat sportsbooks. We get into the KOL wars (Kalshi vs. Polymarket), the line between paid shilling and product marketing, and what “parlays” look like on prediction platforms. Then: Aster vs. Hyperliquid and DeFiLlama’s delist sparks transparency questions, while BNB Chain’s 72-hour meme-coin supercycle goes boom→bust. Privacy takes center stage as Zcash rips and the “privacy meta” returns. We close with Galaxy One’s 8% yield pitch — BlockFi déjà vu or smarter risk management in a post-CeFi world?

Show highlights

🔹 Polymarket’s $2B at $9B — led by ICE (NYSE parent): why a TradFi giant is backing prediction markets and what integrations could follow.

🔹 Token tease — the crew debates what a Polymarket token could represent amid a CFTC path and U.S. re-entry.

🔹 KOL Wars: Kalshi vs. Polymarket — disclosed influencer marketing vs. “paid shilling,” and where the ethical line actually sits.

🔹 Product vs. Asset promos — why “use this platform” ≠ “buy this ticker,” and the gray zone of shilling specific markets or sides.

🔹 Do prediction markets influence reality? When odds can sway decisions (Fed, elections), and why markets may self-correct before hitting “99%.”

🔹 Sportsbooks in the crosshairs — parlays on prediction markets, Robinhood funnels, and why DraftKings/FanDuel should care.

🔹 Aster vs. Hyperliquid — incentives, wash-trading risk, and DeFiLlama’s delist after suspicious Binance-correlated volumes.

🔹 BNB’s 72-hour supercycle — memecoins moon, CZ’s “not endorsements” tweet, then a brutal boom→bust as bridgers retreat.

🔹 Privacy supercycle — Zcash rips on Naval/Mert momentum; Zashi UX + NEAR intents cited vs. “it’s just flows” skepticism.

🔹 Old coin, new crowd — why ZEC’s age + thin float can turbocharge moves, even with lower on-chain usage than Monero.

🔹 Galaxy One’s 8% yield — comeback arc for BlockFi’s Zach Prince or smarter, public-company-backed risk management?

🔹 CeFi vs. DeFi lending — on-chain transparency, Coinbase’s approach, 60-day gates, and whether unsecured credit is creeping back.

Hosts

⭐️Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly

⭐️Robert Leshner, CEO & Co-founder of Superstate

⭐️Tarun Chitra, Managing Partner at Robot Ventures

⭐️Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly 

Timestamps

00:00 Intro

01:08 Polymarket & Shayne Coplan’s Journey to Success

05:28 The Role of Prediction Markets

10:21 Kalshi vs. Polymarket: KOL Wars 

23:56 Sports Betting & Prediction Markets

29:19 BNB Chain's Memecoin Boom and Bust

33:55 Aster and Defi Lama: The Delisting Drama

37:04 Privacy Supercycle: The Zcash Bull Run

50:02 Galaxy One: BlockFi's Comeback?

Disclosures

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