10x Research: Market profitability is driven by a small elite group; most participants are more like "emotional bettors."

According to Odaily Planet Daily, 10x Research, in its latest series of studies (Part 2), points out that although prediction markets often claim to be based on "collective intelligence," data shows that market accuracy and profitability mainly come from a very small number of professional traders with information advantages, rather than from the general public.

The report states that most users behave more like sports betting, preferring narrative-driven, emotion-driven, and long-odds betting; in contrast, a small group of professionals systematically obtains stable returns by pricing probabilities, hedging risks, and utilizing order loss balance and expectation convergence.

Part One of 10x Research analyzed the structural inflection points in prediction markets, including increased liquidity, clearer regulations, and accelerated entry of institutional and retail investors, pointing out that early advantages in new markets are often captured by "information superiors." Part Three will provide ten executable trading frameworks and real-world case studies for prediction markets.

The team believes that with the prediction market expected to expand further in 2026, now is a critical window to examine trading structures, and "understanding their core mechanisms is crucial before liquidity deepens and simple arbitrage disappears."