Riot Games in potential discussions with Kalshi, Polymarket to expand esports sponsorships: report

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2025/07/03: Riot Games draws criticism for esports betting sponsorships on Valorant and League of Legends 2026/07/27: South Korean esports star made honorary police officer for anti-gambling campaign 2026/04/14: Kambi unveils Google esports data partnership 2025/07/28: Kalshi announces partnership with Elon Musk’s xAI

The Backstory

Riot tests a new category as esports looks for revenue

Riot Games’ reported discussions with Kalshi and Polymarket land at a sensitive point for competitive gaming. The publisher behind League of Legends and Valorant is trying to expand commercial support for its top esports circuits while preserving trust in competitions built around young, digitally native audiences. Prediction markets offer a new pool of sponsorship money at a time when esports teams and leagues are seeking more durable revenue, but they also bring legal and reputational risks that resemble, and in some ways exceed, those attached to traditional sports betting.

The talks, reported ahead of the League of Legends World Championship in October, follow Riot’s earlier decision to allow betting-related sponsorships for Tier 1 League of Legends and Valorant teams under restrictions. That move was framed by Riot as a way to pull activity toward regulated operators and away from black-market betting. It was also an acknowledgment that wagering already surrounds esports, whether publishers embrace it or not.

But the potential addition of prediction markets would mark a broader shift. Kalshi and Polymarket are not conventional sportsbooks. They let users trade event contracts tied to outcomes, a structure that has allowed the sector to argue it belongs under federal commodities oversight rather than state-by-state gambling regulation. That distinction is now central to the political and legal fight over whether sports and esports event contracts should be treated as financial products or bets.

Riot’s earlier betting pivot set the stage

Riot has already absorbed backlash over gambling’s place in its esports ecosystem. In June, the company drew criticism for enabling esports betting sponsorships on top-tier League of Legends and Valorant teams, with fans warning that gambling branding could normalize wagering among younger viewers and heighten integrity concerns. Riot said it would impose guardrails, including limits on where gambling ads appear and restrictions on betting logos on team jerseys.

John Needham, Riot’s president of publishing and esports, argued at the time that ignoring betting would not eliminate it. His position was that engagement with regulated operators, combined with integrity controls and responsible gambling requirements, would be safer than leaving fans exposed to offshore or unlicensed markets. Teams were expected to build internal programs covering responsible betting, underage gambling prevention and competitive integrity.

The reaction showed the difficulty of that argument in esports. Unlike major U.S. sports leagues, League of Legends and Valorant have global fan bases with large youth audiences, creator-driven communities and deep ties to online culture. Community responses cited match-fixing, addiction risk and the possibility that betting incentives could make fan behavior more toxic. Even supporters of Riot’s commercial logic tended to describe betting money as a response to financial pressure rather than an uncomplicated opportunity.

That earlier controversy matters because any Kalshi or Polymarket sponsorship would not start from a blank slate. Riot would be entering a category adjacent to the betting deals it had just defended, while introducing a product that many regulators and gambling operators say should be treated as wagering even if it uses the language of markets and contracts.

Prediction markets have moved quickly into sports

Kalshi and Polymarket have grown from political and financial forecasting platforms into businesses courting mainstream sports audiences. Their appeal to leagues is clear: They promise fan engagement, data-driven products and sponsorship dollars without necessarily following the same licensing path as sportsbooks. For rights holders trying to diversify revenue, that structure is attractive. It also creates friction with state regulators and incumbent betting companies.

The National Hockey League underscored the sector’s momentum when it signed multiyear partnerships with Kalshi and Polymarket. Those deals gave the platforms access to NHL data and branding and placed them alongside league broadcasts and events. The agreement suggested that prediction markets are no longer fringe products seeking legitimacy from the outside. They are now being considered by major sports properties as commercial partners.

The NHL deal also exposed the conflict around the category. The American Gaming Association criticized the partnerships, saying professional leagues should not lend their brands to companies it views as operating outside state gambling safeguards. Nevada regulators, meanwhile, have said sports event contracts should be treated like traditional wagers in the state and offered only by properly licensed sports-pool operators. Connecticut has also moved against prediction market companies, accusing them of illegal sports gambling.

For Riot, the sports precedent cuts both ways. Deals with established leagues make Kalshi and Polymarket harder to dismiss as speculative partners. Yet the same deals invite scrutiny from regulators and gambling interests that could extend to esports if publishers formalize relationships with the platforms.

Data rights are becoming the control point

The reported requirement that any Kalshi or Polymarket sponsorship connect through GRID Esports for official betting data points to the larger architecture behind modern esports wagering. Official data is valuable because it gives operators faster, more reliable information on match schedules, in-game events, player statistics and results. It also gives publishers more leverage to monitor how their competitions are used in betting or prediction products.

That issue extends beyond wagering. Esports data has become a commercial product in its own right. Kambi’s Abios division recently unveiled a multiyear esports data partnership with Google, supplying information on League of Legends, Counter-Strike, Dota 2 and Valorant for use in Google Search and the Google App. The deal showed how esports data is moving into mainstream consumer platforms, where schedules, live scores and player statistics can deepen engagement even without a betting component.

For betting and prediction markets, official data also has an integrity function. If Riot wants to argue that sanctioned commercial partnerships are safer than unregulated activity, it needs visibility into who uses its data, how markets are formed and whether suspicious activity can be detected. That is especially important in esports, where match-fixing concerns have long centered on lower-tier competitions, uneven player compensation and fragmented oversight across regions.

Still, official data access does not settle the broader policy question. It may help Riot manage its own ecosystem, but it does not answer whether event contracts tied to esports outcomes are gambling under state law, commodities under federal supervision or some hybrid that regulators have not yet fully defined.

Youth gambling concerns shape the backlash

Esports’ demographics make the gambling debate more acute than in many traditional sports. League of Legends’ biggest stars often function as role models for younger audiences, and their influence is already being enlisted in anti-gambling efforts. In South Korea, League of Legends icon Lee Sang-hyeok, known as Faker, was made an honorary police officer for an anti-gambling campaign run by the Korean National Police Agency.

The campaign focused on youth cyber gambling and encouraged young people to report gambling activity and seek counseling. Faker’s appointment highlighted how authorities in one of esports’ most important markets view online gambling as a social risk connected to digital entertainment. It also illustrated the reputational tension for Riot: The same game ecosystem that produces global ambassadors for gambling prevention is considering deeper commercial links with markets that allow users to stake money on outcomes.

That tension does not mean Riot will reject prediction market sponsorships. It does mean any agreement would likely need strict controls on promotion, age-gating, market integrity, team education and data use. The company’s public posture has been to evaluate the sector through the lens of competitive integrity, fan experience and ecosystem value. Those criteria reflect the core stakes. A sponsorship that strengthens team finances but weakens community trust could prove costly over time.

Kalshi and Polymarket bring scale, scrutiny and strategic appeal

Kalshi and Polymarket are becoming more sophisticated and better capitalized, increasing their appeal to leagues and publishers. Kalshi recently announced a partnership with Elon Musk’s xAI to bring Grok into its trading platform, while Polymarket has pursued a path back into the U.S. regulated market through its acquisition of QCEX. Both companies are positioning themselves as technology and market infrastructure firms, not merely betting alternatives.

That positioning is central to why Riot may see the category differently from sportsbook sponsorships. Prediction markets can be marketed as fan engagement products that reward forecasting and information gathering. In esports, where audiences already consume statistics, patches, player form and competitive analysis, the format could fit naturally into viewing behavior.

But the same features that make prediction markets engaging also raise the stakes. Highly liquid markets on match outcomes could intensify betting-related discussion around players and teams. If younger fans perceive those markets as part of the official esports experience, Riot’s safeguards will face close examination.

The backstory, then, is not simply that Riot is chasing another sponsorship category. It is that esports, sports leagues, data companies and prediction platforms are converging before regulators have reached consensus. Riot’s decision will signal whether one of gaming’s most influential publishers believes prediction markets can be integrated without undermining the competitive trust on which its esports business depends.