Manifold Review
Manifold Markets is a unique option among top prediction markets. Users can create and resolve their own markets, and the platform has two currencies. Not surprisingly, Manifold has attracted about $2 million in funding despite being a virtual money platform.
This prediction market with fictional currency offers new possibilities for prediction markets. If you want to run prediction markets as well as trade in them, here’s what you need to know about Manifold Markets.
What is Manifold Markets?
Manifold Markets is a play money prediction market platform. Traders use fictional currency to bet on prediction markets created by Manifold’s users.
The ability for users to create markets sets Manifold apart from other prediction market platforms. Manifold’s goal is to scale the benefits prediction markets offer to people interested in the likelihood of future events. Manifold also allows traders to donate to charity through their fictional currency.
How Does Manifold Markets Work?
Manifold Markets allows traders to create their own prediction markets. Anyone can open a market for any question. That puts users in charge of resolving those markets, but it also allows prediction markets to grapple with many questions across a range of subjects.
Manifold traders use a fictional currency, mana, to trade on any prediction market they want. Contracts are priced between $0.01 and $0.99. Correct predictions pay out at $1 per contract while incorrect predictions make nothing.
However, Manifold also pays prize points for correct predictions. Prize points are a premium currency that accompany payouts from contracts held to maturity. Manifold users can redeem Prize points for mana or redeem their prize points for charitable donations. For every 1,000 prize points redeemed, Manifold will donate $0.95 to charity.
Traders can also buy mana with real money. Real-money purchases only buy mana, not prize points. There’s also no way for Manifold traders to redeem either fictional currency for real money. Manifold is entirely free to play.
Are there extra benefits to using Manifold Markets?
Two features set Manifold Markets apart from competitors like Polymarket and Kalshi: customers creating their own prediction markets and being able to donate to charity with their winnings.
Manifold Markets offers customers the ability to create their own prediction markets. If you have a burning question that you want feedback on, then you can create a market. Markets work best when they’re for a single question with a clear outcome and deciding factor. Play money does not make fair settlements less important to traders.
Traders also have the ability to donate some of their non-monetary winnings to charity. Manifold will donate $0.95 to charity for every 1,000 prize points traders redeem. It’s a unique feature that draws on the money earned from mana purchases. Manifold has a list of charities it often donates to, but customers can suggest their own, too.
How to register for and trade on Manifold Markets
Step 1
Manifold has one of the easiest sign-up processes among the main prediction markets. It doesn’t have know-your-customer requirements and doesn’t use real money. That eliminates steps that other prediction markets must use in their registration processes.
All you need for Manifold Markets is a Google account. Log in to your Google email, confirm your details, and then you’re ready to trade.
Step 2
Setting your Manifold account up is fast, too. You’ll get your first 100 mana for free, then select the categories you’re most interested in trading in. After that, you’ll get an offer to get 1,000 mana for verifying your phone number. Once you enter your verification code, the 1,000 mana is available immediately. In less than two minutes, you’ll have 1,100 mana to use to begin trading.
From there, you can browse Manifold’s markets to see which markets are most interesting to you. You’ll see the number of traders in each market and a summary of outcome probabilities. There are various filters you can use to narrow your search for markets on your favorite subjects, too.
Step 3
Making trades on Manifold is easy. Select the contract you’d like to buy, adjust the amount of mana you’d like to spend, then confirm the order. Selecting the “advanced” option also allows you to place limit orders, which only executes your trade when the contract’s price reaches a certain value.
Your Manifold trade also shows you the amount of money you’ll pay in trading fees and how the contract’s probability will change in response to your trade. You can see how much of your mana will go toward fees in a detailed breakdown explaining the fee calculation. The probability change has a similarly detailed breakdown as well.
Once your trade is completed, you’ll see information about it below the market. Your trade will also be available in your account on the “summary” and “trades” tabs. Like other prediction markets, Manifold makes it easy to track your positions, whether you want to sell early or hold your contracts to the end.
How to trade safely on Manifold Markets
Trading safely on Manifold is easy. You don’t have to risk real money, so your financial information is already safe. That doesn’t mean you have a free pass to be unreasonable on Manifold.
Having a trading plan is still a good idea on Manifold. You should have some knowledge about the topic you’re trading on. Even though it’s play money, mana is a limited resource that can be refilled most easily with real money. It can be tempting to chase losses to prove yourself right on the platform’s markets, but it’s bad practice that can lead to impulsive real-money purchases you shouldn’t make.
As with any other digital platform, protect your login information. Even though you have play money, your account integrity is important for staying safe online.
Manifold market fees
Manifold may not be a real-money platform yet, but it still has trading fees. When you buy a set of contracts, Manifold takes up to 7% of your wager depending on how likely the outcome you bet on is. Low-probability events are charged higher fees than high-probability events.
These fees are split 50/50 between the user who created the market and Manifold itself. It’s part of an initiative to create a sustainable mana economy on the platform. Even though it’s a fictional currency, sudden changes in mana’s value on the platform would interfere with its markets’ prices and therefore predictive value.
Hard questions about money supply don’t disappear with play money, and Manifold is continually finding ways to answer those questions.
Is Manifold Markets a legit company?
Yes. Manifold Markets was founded in December 2021 and received investment from FTX in 2022. However, Manifold has had nothing to do with FTX’s operations, so it doesn’t come with the baggage FTX carried before imploding
Manifold is registered in Austin, Texas. It must adhere to basic reporting requirements demanded of all registered businesses. Manifold is also available to U.S. customers without the use of a VPN. Freely available and regulated as any other credible business, Manifold is a safe place for purchases of its fictional currency and trading in its user-created markets.
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