Kalshi Files a Deposit and Trading Rewards Programme Worth Up to $5,000 a Customer
By Antonina Tupikova · Founder, iGaming Times3 min read
The two-year programme lets Kalshi match deposits and trading with bonus credits, target them by account age, inactivity and location, and confine them to sports contracts. It went to the CFTC as the exchange certified contracts on Premier League sanctions against Manchester City, days after reports of a verdict against the club.
- Kalshi has self-certified a "Deposit and Trading Reward" incentive programme with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), to run for two years from no earlier than 28 September 2026 and pay bonus credits to individual customers for qualifying deposits and trades
- Each customer can receive up to $2,500 per time-limited promotion and $5,000 over the programme, through deposit or trading matches of up to 100% or fixed rewards; the match rates, minimums and reward values sit in a confidential appendix and are undisclosed
- Promotions can be confined to sports, or to a single league such as the NFL or NBA, and targeted by account age, inactivity, prior activity and geographic location; credits expire within one to 30 days and can be withdrawn only after an equal amount has been traded
- The filing follows a CFTC staff advisory in August that warned of deficient incentive filings for event contracts and of threshold bonuses that encourage wash trading
- Kalshi also certified contracts on whether the Premier League will sanction Manchester City and on how many MLB games will be played in 2027, while DraftKings' exchange DKeX certified NBA award and "first points" contracts
A Bonus Programme Filed as an Exchange Rule
KalshiEX LLC told the CFTC in a self-certification dated 15 September that it would implement the Deposit and Trading Reward Program on or after 28 September, ten business days later, under Kalshi Rule 3.13(f), which lets the exchange create programmes "that provide incentives to Participants that encourage trading". Kalshi says it is designed to "drive both deposit and trading activity, and strengthen liquidity and price discovery". A modified version on the CFTC's portal has an official receipt date of 25 September and a status of "10 Day Review"; it keeps the 28 September start and a term to 28 September 2028.
The programme is open to Kalshi "Self-Clearing Members who are natural persons" in good standing who have passed identity verification and are not under compliance investigation, with no limit on numbers. Each promotion can then be restricted to a group defined by criteria in a confidential Appendix B, drawn from categories the filing lists as "inactivity lookback, account age, funded or unfunded account status, prior deposit or trading activity, prior activity or inactivity in one or more Contract categories, geographic location, or account status".
How the Rewards Work
Rewards run through "Time-Limited Promotions" of three to 90 days. A deposit reward is earned with one deposit at or above a set minimum; a trading reward once the collateral committed to trades in eligible contracts reaches a minimum, counting only fills priced between $0.03 and $0.97. Kalshi chooses a percentage match or a fixed reward, and a customer may earn at most one of each kind per promotion, up to $2,500 per promotion and $5,000 in total. A fixed reward can be no more than three times the qualifying minimum, so the $2,500 maximum requires a minimum of at least $833, and where no minimum is set the reward cannot exceed $25. A percentage match can reach "a full 100% match", capped at $2,500.
Rewards are paid as "Promotional Bonus Credits", in a lump sum or in instalments over three to ten days. Credits expire one to 30 days after issue and "may only be withdrawn after the Program Participant has traded an amount equal to the Bonus Credit". Eligible contracts can be the whole exchange or a single category: sports, one sport or league, crypto, economics, financials, politics, weather and climate, or culture and entertainment, announced at least 24 hours before each promotion.
The modified filing adds safeguards: it excludes trades linked to self-matching, wash trading or pre-arranged trading, stops incentives stacking on a single trade, and trims payments that would leave a trade with net-negative fees. Kalshi says it "is not aware of any substantive opposing views".
The CFTC's Division of Market Oversight said in Staff Letter 26-23 on 12 August that it had seen more incentive filings for event contracts, "including filings that are procedurally or substantively deficient". It warned that threshold bonuses can encourage trading "solely to reach volume targets", said rewards should not be "gamified, casino-style", and said a substantive change to a pending filing needs a new submission and a new ten-business-day review.
Manchester City, MLB and the NBA
On 28 September Kalshi certified "Will the English Premier League on Manchester City
Kalshi, which has partnership deals with five MLB clubs, also certified contracts on the number of regular-season MLB games played in 2027, with payouts that scale with how far the total lands from a strike. MLB's collective bargaining agreement with its players expires on 1 December 2026, according to ESPN. Railbird Exchange, trading as DKeX, the exchange DraftKings launched in June, certified on 25 September contracts on whether Nikola Jokic wins the 2026-27 NBA MVP award and whether Jalen Brunson scores the first points of the Philadelphia 76ers' game against the New York Knicks on 20 October, describing both as swaps.
This Is a Sportsbook Bonus Written in Exchange Language
Deposit matches up to 100%, credits that must be turned over once before withdrawal, short expiry windows, targeting of inactive customers and NFL-only promotions are the standard tools of a sportsbook welcome or reload offer. The caps are real limits. But the filing's safeguards are aimed at market abuse, not at the customer: it contains no affordability or responsible-gambling measures. Kalshi accounts are open from 18, and in Ohio and Tennessee sportsbook customers must be 21. The Sixth Circuit ruled three days before the programme's start date that both states may enforce their gambling laws against Kalshi's sports contracts, and a sports-only deposit match looks likely to appear in their arguments.
The Numbers That Matter Are Confidential, and the Clock May Have Restarted
The match percentages, minimum deposits and reward values that decide what a customer is actually offered are in Appendix B, which Kalshi has asked the CFTC to keep confidential, so neither state regulators nor customers can compare them with a licensed operator's terms. The timing is also uncertain. If the CFTC treats the 25 September version as a new submission, as its advisory says substantive changes require, ten business days would run to 9 October, not 28 September. Kalshi's filing still gives 28 September.
Sanctions, Lockouts and Prop Bets Are All Event Contracts Now
The City contract settles on a disciplinary decision made by a handful of people, with barred insiders running from the league board to the club's lawyers. The MLB contract is, in substance, a position on whether owners and players settle their labour dispute. DKeX's first-points contract is a sportsbook prop in all but name, certified as a swap on the day the Sixth Circuit held that Kalshi's sports contracts are not swaps. The products are moving towards betting as the case law moves away from the exchanges.
Kalshi's programme is capped, time-limited and filed in the right form. It is also a deposit bonus, open to 18-year-olds, on an exchange whose sports contracts two federal appeals courts now say states may treat as gambling.
