The app, known internally as “Arena,” would likely run on a video game-style points system rather than real money, though the company reportedly has not ruled out cash betting later.
CNBC separately confirmed the project with a source familiar with the plans.
Meta has reach that the competition could only dream of. It can put Arena in front of 3.56 billion daily users.
Arena would run on points instead of cash. Sceptics may argue that a prediction market with nothing to win on it is closer to a poll than a trade, and Meta has been here before. Its 2020 app Forecast used the same play-money setup and folded in 2022.
Forecast was not a one-off. Meta has launched and buried a long line of standalone apps, from TikTok clone Lasso to Pinterest-style Hobbi, Cameo-like Super and Substack rival Bulletin, most of them through its New Product Experimentation unit. Threads is the one that stuck.
META barely budged. The selling hit the incumbents instead.
The sector keeps setting records regardless, booking $28.4 billion in May volume, a fourth straight monthly high. Bernstein estimates the market may reach $1 trillion in annual volume by the end of the decade.
Whether Arena ships is itself close to a coin flip, with insiders calling it experimental. For now, the real downside sits with the names already taking real money.
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