Some Kalshi Users Experience Outages During College Football Games

Kalshi, the event-contracts marketplace valued at $5 billion, experienced a rocky Saturday as some users reported glitches and delays during college football games, a peak trading period for the platform. According to user reports, nearly half of Kalshi’s user base encountered difficulties, with some temporarily unable to process orders or view accurate account balances.

One user shared a message from Kalshi acknowledging the issues. “The Exchange is experiencing temporary delays,” the message stated. “Balances and positions may not be accurately reflected at this time.”

Screenshots and recordings provided to CNBC by a user indicated an inability to access balance information or view active positions while the issues persisted. This raised concerns among users potentially exposed to unexpected fluctuations in trading outcomes.

A Kalshi spokesperson, however, disputed the characterization of a full-blown outage. In a statement to CNBC, the spokesperson stated that “the exchange ‘never stopped functioning properly.'” The statement further emphasized that clearing, advanced trading and institutional trading were unaffected.

“There were some glitches and delays on our web and app product, which affected less than half of our user base,” the spokesperson elaborated. “The engineering team is fixing them as we speak, and the platform should be back to normal very soon.” These assurances come as users took to social media platform X to express frustration, citing difficulties in placing bets and concerns over unprocessed orders.

Notably, the incident occurred just over a week after Kalshi announced a substantial $300 million Series D funding round, which propelled the company’s valuation to $5 billion. This represented a significant increase from its $2 billion valuation following a Series C round in June. The Series D was co-led by prominent venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Sequoia Capital, with participation from Paradigm. Other investors included Coinbase Ventures, General Catalyst, Spark Capital and CapitalG.

Market analysts suggest that the outage could raise questions about the platform’s scalability and infrastructure robustness, especially as it aims to attract larger institutional investors and expand into new markets. The ability to maintain seamless and reliable trading during peak periods is critical for retaining user confidence and supporting further growth.

Founded in 2018, Kalshi has distinguished itself by providing a platform for trading on a diverse range of real-world events. Its success hinges on a cutting-edge technology stack and complex risk management system. This incident highlights the ongoing challenges associated with operating a sophisticated exchange in a high-growth, dynamic environment and the need for constant infrastructure improvements.