Invesaro

Invesaro publishes investment theses and settles them against the market in public: with a date, a basket of companies and a verdict.

Investment thesis

Kalshi's sports bets never paid the league data toll, and the Ninth Circuit just rebuilt the toll booth

LivePublished August 30, 2026150-day horizonregulation
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In short

  1. What is happening
    A US appeals court sided with states in the Kalshi sports betting fight, potentially reviving Arizona's prosecution
  2. Why it matters
    A court win for the states pushes sports wagering back into licensed books, where every bet pays an official data fee prediction markets never owed.
  3. Who benefits
    Genius Sports, Sportradar Group, DraftKings, Flutter Entertainment
  4. What must hold
    Assumptions are statements that must stay true for the thesis to make sense.
    Assumptions: 4. See the assumptions
  5. When is the verdict
    The horizon is the time we give a thesis. That many days after publication we settle it: we compare the basket of companies with the market benchmark and give a verdict.
    January 27, 2027, 150 days after publication
  6. Our score at publication
    A score from 0 to 100 given on the day of publication, before the market has verified anything. On the results page we check in public whether higher-scored theses do better.
    65 out of 100
Basket return
-5.2%
equal weight, since publication
The market over the same window
-1.7%
benchmark for this basket
Edge over the market
-3.5%
in percentage points

Companies in the basket

GENIGenius SportsSRADSportradar GroupDKNGDraftKingsFLUTFlutter Entertainment

The argument

The free rider had a specific name

For roughly eighteen months, sports event contracts have been the fastest growing corner of American wagering, and the reason is not product design. It is cost structure. A bet placed at a state licensed sportsbook carries three layers of overhead: a state licence, a state gaming tax that reaches into the double digits and above fifty percent in New York, and an official data fee paid to the league whose game is being bet on. A sports event contract sold under a CFTC self certification carried none of those. The federal wrapper was not just a legal convenience, it was a permanent margin subsidy, and it let a handful of venues offer better pricing in fifty states at once, including states where sportsbooks are illegal outright.

What this thesis rests on

Each one is a statement that has to be true. We go back to every live thesis on a schedule and check these against public sources, so each leg carries either what we found or the date we look next.

Archive: reviews of this thesis are paused. Last review September 14, 2026.

  1. Genius Sports reports group revenue growth of at least 15% year over year in each of its next two reported quarters.

    financial · Open

    Checked September 14, 2026, nothing published either way

  2. DraftKings reports US sportsbook handle for the quarter ending 30 September 2026 at least 10% above the same quarter a year earlier.

    financial · Open

    Checked September 14, 2026, nothing published either way

  3. Robinhood discloses in a 10-Q or 8-K that it has suspended or geofenced sports event contracts in at least one US state before 31 January 2027.

    regulatory · Open

    Checked September 14, 2026, nothing published either way

  4. Sportradar announces no termination or non-renewal of its official NBA or MLB data rights agreements before 31 January 2027.

    competitive · Open

    Checked September 14, 2026, nothing published either way

Show the causal chain step by step
  1. Ninth Circuit sides with states in Kalshi case
  2. State enforcement and Arizona prosecution revive
  3. Prediction markets geofence states or seek licences
  4. Volume routes back to licensed sportsbooks
  5. Recaptured bets pay official league data fees
  6. Genius Sports and Sportradar
  7. DraftKings and Flutter

This thesis, over time

What has happened since publication. Every entry is computed as of its own date, from price history.

October 6, 2026

Day 38 of 150: basket -5.2%

The first quarter of the horizon is behind this thesis. The equal-weight basket stands at -5.2% since publication day. The benchmark (S&P 500) returned -1.7% over the same window, so the basket trails its market by 3.5 percentage points. The strongest contributor is SRAD (+3.2%), the weakest is GENI (-17.0%). 112 days remain until the verdict.

September 14, 2026

Review on day 15: nothing moved

We went back to this thesis on day 15 of 150 and checked each of its 4 assumptions against public sources. No news either way: 4. The equal-weight basket stands at -4.6% since publication day. The benchmark (.INX) returned -0.7% over the same window, so the basket trails its market by 3.9 percentage points. 135 days remain until the verdict.

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This is analysis, not investment advice and not a recommendation to buy or sell anything. We publish it and track it in public, mistakes included. Any decision is yours and yours alone.