Artnet says its price data will settle Kalshi bets on the auctions Artnet News covers

Artnet, the company that owns Artnet News, announced Wednesday it has become the “official art partner” of the prediction market Kalshi. Artnet said its Price Database "will serve as the settlement source" for bets on this month’s New York auctions, which it said are "currently live on Kalshi."

Kalshi had already informed federal regulators. On Friday, the company filed a class certification with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission for contracts titled “Will [artwork] sell for [above/below/exactly/at least/at most/between] [value] [time period]?”

The filing names its “Source Agency” as “the Artnet Price Database, operated by Artnet Worldwide Corporation, a subsidiary of artnet AG, and published at artnet.com.”

The contract centers on Vincent van Gogh’s 1890 painting Châtaigniers en fleurs, asking whether it will sell above, below or within specified price ranges between November 16 and 20. Sotheby’s is offering the painting at its Blaquier-Arrieta Collection evening sale in New York on November 18.

The filing rules out auction house announcements and press reports. “Guarantees and results announced by an auction house or reported in the press do not determine the Underlying,” it says, and “only the Artnet Price Database record governs.”

Kalshi’s live market on the painting says otherwise. The market, which opened September 30, will be “verified from the amount displayed under ‘Lot Sold’ on the Sotheby’s website,” its rules said as of late Wednesday.

About $8,686 had been traded on it by then, with traders giving the painting a 58% chance of selling above $200 million.

When Kalshi launched its art markets on May 26, it said each contract “resolves against publicly reported results.”

The new terms also lock in Artnet’s first entry. “Only the first value the Artnet Price Database publishes for a lot after the lot is offered is used for resolution,” the filing says. A later correction counts only if Kalshi decides “in its sole discretion” that it fixes “a material error.”

A work recorded as sold, “including to its guarantor or irrevocable bidder, remains sold even if the sale is later cancelled, rescinded, or not paid for,” the filing says.

The contracts cover more than individual paintings. Kalshi can offer bets on categories of works, such as art by artists born in or after 1975 or paintings by Japanese artists. It can also offer bets on if a work sells for a certain percentage of its high estimate or which lot achieves the highest, second-highest or other ranked sale price. Kalshi limits each member to $25,000 in positions on any one contract.

I have some experience with these markets. In June, Urgent Matter bet about a dollar apiece on five lots from the Joe Lewis collection sale at Sotheby’s in London. We won $4.31 on a Modigliani and $2.05 on a Klimt and lost the other three. Urgent Matter was also covering that sale.

I also worked as a reporter at Artnet News before I launched Urgent Matter.

For a fraction of a second after that June story, Urgent Matter considered running prediction markets of our own as a get-rich-quick scheme to fund the newsroom while feeling like Robin Hood along the way. Whoever sets the market and gets to say what happened is the one who comes out ahead.

Artnet’s announcement ran on the Artnet News website, in the Market section, under the byline “Artnet Editors.” It says Artnet will “help curate prediction markets tied to major auction results, fairs, and other events” and that results “will be published in this post.”

The next paragraph reads: “Artnet News, Artnet’s outlet for breaking news, analysis, and criticism, is not involved in the creation of these markets or the verification of results.”

The post ends with an ad: “Access the data behind the headlines with the artnet Price Database.”

Kalshi’s own announcement says Artnet will propose market topics “for Kalshi’s consideration,” while Kalshi “designs the contracts, operates the exchange, and resolves markets under its regulatory framework.” Its boilerplate lists Artnet’s products as the “Artnet Price Database, Artnet News, Artnet Auctions, and the Artnet Gallery Network.”

Neither announcement discloses the financial terms of the deal.

When Artnet News launched its paid Pro section, it promised readers “clear-eyed investigations driven by Artnet’s industry-leading Price Database.”

The Artnet Intelligence Report published in March opens with a letter from Naomi Rea, its former editor-in-chief. It ends: “Thank you, as ever, to Artnet Pro’s reporters and editors and Artnet’s Data Science and Price Database teams.”

The report’s masthead lists Artnet News’ editors and reporters alongside 20 members of the Artnet Price Database staff, from its vice president of data services to data entry. An ad on page 4 sells Artnet PRO on “insider scoops, industry gossip.”

The report’s methodology section says every lot in the database “is verified against auction catalogues or directly with the auction houses.”

The Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics tells reporters to “avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived” and to “disclose unavoidable conflicts.” It also says to “distinguish news from advertising and shun hybrids that blur the lines between the two.”

Kalshi’s filing addresses insiders. Beyond its “general prohibition against trading on material nonpublic information,” it bars trading by owners and consignors, auction house staff “involved in consigning, estimating, guaranteeing, withdrawing, conducting, or reporting” a sale, third-party guarantors, irrevocable bidders and bidders.

It prevents “any employee, officer, contractor, or agent of artnet AG or its subsidiaries, including Artnet Worldwide Corporation, who compiles, verifies, or publishes records in the Artnet Price Database or has access to material nonpublic information relating to the Underlying.”

It also prevents anyone who “has advance knowledge of, whether or for what price” a work sells. The filing does not mention Artnet News or its reporters by name, though a reporter with advance knowledge of a sale could still fall under its general ban.

The live Van Gogh market lists two prohibitions: “Persons who are employed by any of the Source Agencies” and anyone holding “material, non-public information on the Underlying.” It does not name Artnet.

On August 11, Artnet News senior reporter Katya Kazakina reported in an Artnet PRO story that Sotheby’s had won the consignment of the Blaquier family collection, which includes the Van Gogh in Kalshi’s filing. Sotheby’s “went all out this time, offering a big guarantee, according to several market sources,” the story said. Sotheby’s declined to comment.

The same story quoted “a top art advisor” saying “on a good day, this painting can fetch $150 million to $200 million.”

“I’m certain that all of the auction houses have told their employees that they cannot participate,” Mari-Claudia Jiménez, a former Sotheby’s chairman who is now global co-head of the art law practice at Withers, told Urgent Matter in June. “Because they clearly have insider information about these kinds of things.”

The filing keeps Artnet’s own sales out of the markets. It excludes “sales on Artnet Auctions or any other auction platform operated by artnet AG or its affiliates.” Its trading ban covers employees of “artnet AG or its subsidiaries.”

Jeffrey Yin, who gave the Artnet announcement’s lead quote, is CEO of both Artnet and Artsy. Beowolff Capital, the firm of former Goldman Sachs partner Andrew Wolff, brought the two companies together in April. Artsy hosts auctions on its site for auction houses and nonprofits. The filing’s barred employees list does not mention Artsy.

Kalshi’s filed analysis of Artnet as a settlement source is confidential. The filing places it in “Appendix D (Confidential) - Source Agency,” next to confidential appendices on “Further Considerations” and “Compliance with Core Principles.” Kalshi submitted “a request for FOIA confidential treatment” with them.

In July, CFTC staff told exchanges in a staff advisory that cash-settled event contracts “may create an incentive to manipulate or artificially influence the data from which the product’s price is derived.”

Staff said identifying settlement sources up front “helps ensure that DCMs separately evaluate the manipulation risks posed by each settlement source and methodology.” DCM is the agency’s term for exchanges like Kalshi.

Kalshi’s filing cites that advisory. It certifies that the outcome, “as recorded in the Artnet Price Database,” is “beyond the control of the parties to the relevant contract, agreement, or transaction.”

CFTC guidance on cash-settled contracts asks exchanges to show settlement is based on a price series that is “reliable, acceptable, publicly available” and timely.

The Artnet Price Database is a paid product. A one-day pass for fine art costs $32.50 and covers five searches.

Kalshi’s May launch said that through its markets, “investors of all financial backgrounds can now access the asset class.” Ian Cook, of Kalshi’s Markets team, said in Wednesday’s announcement that “the art world has historically been reserved to an elite cohort.” In the filing, Kalshi lists the contracts under “Entertainment/Pop Culture.”

When CNN became Kalshi's "official prediction markets partner" in December 2025, Kalshi said the deal gave CNN's newsroom access to its real-time data "for developing key storylines and visuals." In Artnet's deal, the company's own data determines the outcomes of the markets.

Artnet News covered Kalshi’s art launch in May. The story’s subhead said Kalshi “has promised more products in time for the fall auctions.”

The partnership will also reach past the auction room. Kalshi said markets could ask “whether a major multimillion-dollar sale will occur at an art fair,” and Artnet said Miami Art Week markets go live later this month.

Friday’s filing covers only works the database records “as sold at public auction.” Galleries report their own fair sales, usually to the press. Neither company has said what will settle a bet on a fair.

Watchdogs have opposed these markets for years. Better Markets, the financial reform group, titled its January fact sheet “Predictably, ‘Prediction Markets’ Are Just Casinos.” In February, the CFTC’s enforcement division issued an advisory stating “the Commission has full authority to police illegal trading practices occurring on any DCM.”

Believe me, the editorial firewall between the business side and the news side of Artnet has long been blurring. Even when I was still working there, reporters, including myself, fumed that the news publication couldn’t even get its own website. If you want to read Artnet News, you have to type the URL in as news.artnet.com. Typing artnet.com alone won’t get you directly there.

Even Hyperallergic called the partnership “a new low” on Wednesday. We agree.

Sotheby’s sells the Van Gogh at 6 p.m. on November 18.

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