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Screenshots Obtained by Tech Sleuth Show Coinbase Planning Prediction Market
- Jane Manchun Wong, once described by the BBC as “the woman scooping Silicon Valley,” has posted screenshots to X showing what appears to be evidence that Coinbase is working on a prediction market.
- Wong said she obtained the images by reverse-engineering publicly available code on the Coinbase website. She also obtained evidence that Coinbase may be planning to allow users to trade stocks and ETFs through its app.
- Coinbase hasn’t confirmed Wong’s revelations but it is promising big news, including new product announcements, at its upcoming ‘Coinbase System Update’ event on December 17.
Screenshots released by Jane Manchun Wong, a San Francisco-based software engineer, the BBC has called “the woman scooping Silicon Valley,” appear to show evidence that Coinbase is about to expand its product offerings to include a prediction market.
The images, posted on X by Wong on November 19, show the user interface of what she claims is Coinbase’s new prediction market, accompanied by the message “Coinbase is working on a prediction market.”
One of the screenshots Wong posted shows a betting market titled ‘Will Trump release any of the Epstein Files?’. This same market also appears on Kalshi (currently the second largest prediction market by volume behind Polymarket). Given that Kalshi and Coinbase have an existing business relationship, it suggests Coinbase’s prediction market could be an integration of Kalshi.
Last week Kalshi chose Coinbase Custody to provide secure custody services for its stablecoin holdings. A full-blown integration of Kalshi by Coinbase, though, would mark a significant step forward in their relationship.
Speaking to Decrypt, Wong said she was able to access Coinbase’s prediction market platform by reverse-engineering the publicly available code on Coinbase’s website.
Wong has earned a strong reputation as someone who can uncover new software features before they’re officially announced. In the past, she’s unearthed Facebook’s dating features and Airbnb’s flight-integration feature.
At the time of writing, Coinbase has neither confirmed nor denied it’s currently developing a prediction market platform.
However, on the same day Wong made her post, Coinbase also posted on X about its upcoming ‘Coinbase System Update’ event on December 17, stating it will include “exciting product announcements” and “key business updates” and proclaiming that “a new era of Coinbase is beginning.”
Related: $2B Coinbase–BVNK Stablecoin Deal Collapses After Exclusive Talks
Wong Uncovers Coinbase Plan to Offer Stocks and ETFs in Its App
In another post, Wong shared screenshots apparently showing Coinbase is also developing functionality that will allow users to purchase stocks and ETFs through its app.
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The screenshots didn’t actually show which stocks would be available; they simply showed a new ‘Stocks’ tab on the user interface, which included the categories ‘Common stocks’ and ‘ETFs’.
It may seem somewhat strange for a crypto exchange like Coinbase to be adding TradFi features to its platform, but they’re not the first to attempt to meld the world of digital assets and TradFi. The popular trading platform, Robinhood, launched tokenised stock trading in June, while the crypto exchange Kraken is among several platforms that allow users to trade tokenised stocks, known as xStocks, on the Solana and BNB blockchains.
Related: Robinhood Doubles Revenue and Triples Earnings in Blockbuster Q3
Interestingly, Robinhood also launched its own prediction market platform earlier this year through an integration with Kalshi, perhaps acting as an example for Coinbase.
Author
Jody McDonald
Jody is a Brisbane-based freelance writer who specialises in writing about business, technology, and the future of work.
