Kalshi will allow select clients of Kalshi Prime, its U.S.-registered futures broker, to use bitcoin, Ethereum and certain stablecoins as collateral for loans, Bloomberg reported on Oct. 21. The arrangement will let traders finance margined perpetual-futures positions on Kalshi’s main exchange without selling the crypto assets they already hold.

Kalshi to offer loans against crypto collateral

Kalshi Katalyst, Kalshi Prime’s lending arm, will issue the loans. BitGo Bank & Trust will hold the digital assets under a tri-party collateral-management structure involving the borrower, the lender and an intermediary responsible for the pledged assets.

Eligible collateral will include bitcoin, Ethereum and stablecoins that meet the requirements of the U.S. GENIUS Act. Kalshi Prime CEO Jeff Bendman said the company plans to add other custodians to the network over time.

“What we wanted to do was make it possible for customers to stay in crypto,” Bendman said.

He cited investors who do not want to sell their bitcoin and Latin American companies that use U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoins in their daily operations.

Kalshi seeks crypto-focused traders

Kalshi began offering perpetual futures, which have no expiration date, on gold, silver and cryptocurrencies in early 2026. Trading volume in those instruments totaled about $1.1 billion on Oct. 20 and had exceeded $1.2 billion as of Oct. 22, according to DefiLlama.

The company has also approached regulators for permission to launch perpetual futures on oil and U.S. stocks. Last month, its clearing entity, Kalshi Klear, applied to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission to use margin for certain event contracts.

Bendman said he expects the crypto-collateral program to make Kalshi more attractive to crypto trading firms and large digital-asset holders. The company aims to draw users who already trade perpetual futures on unregulated offshore venues.

“I built this because I was thinking about digitally native customers who are active and who might already be trading perpetual futures in some of the unregulated offshore markets. That was kind of the audience that I was envisioning, but now that we’ve built it, what’s fascinating is hearing these other use cases come out of the woodwork,” Bendman said.

Kalshi may face structural constraints in that market compared with competitor Polymarket, which operates on a blockchain outside the United States.

Media outlets previously reported that Kalshi was in talks to raise about $1 billion at a $40 billion valuation. Kalshi co-founder and CEO Tarek Mansour has also warned that disputes over state-level regulation of prediction markets could force such companies to leave the United States.

Source: Incrypted