Polymarket is adding some serious Wall Street experience as it tries to bring more institutional money into prediction markets. The company has hired Lisa Mantil, a Goldman Sachs veteran with nearly three decades of experience, as its new head of institutional growth.
Mantil spent 27 years at Goldman and most recently served as a partner and global head of its ETF accelerator, a program that helps clients bring new investment products to market. Her new role puts her in charge of expanding Polymarket's institutional business as the company works to turn its U.S. regulatory footing into something much bigger.
Mantil Comes With Nearly 30 Years of Wall Street Experience
Mantil's background makes this hire particularly interesting. She spent much of her career helping institutions navigate new financial products, which isn't all that far removed from the challenge Polymarket now faces.
"The opportunity to join Polymarket is a rare chance to help shape an exploding asset class at an inflection point in its development," Mantil said in announcing the move. She added that she plans to use her experience helping institutions enter new markets as Polymarket expands prediction markets into investment and risk-management strategies.
Polymarket founder and CEO Shayne Coplan pointed specifically to Mantil's experience and institutional relationships. Those connections could become important as the company tries to reach firms that haven't participated heavily in prediction markets yet.
Prediction Markets Want More Institutional Traders
Retail traders have driven much of the industry's recent growth, particularly around sports event contracts. Institutional participation hasn't developed nearly as quickly, giving Polymarket and its competitors another large group of potential traders to pursue.
Signs of movement are already emerging. Kalshi completed what CNBC described as the industry's first block trade in April, while Polymarket's international platform completed its first the following month. Block trades allow large positions to be privately negotiated without sending the same activity through the regular market.
For Polymarket, institutional expansion could eventually mean more:
- Large traders entering its markets
- Institutional capital moving through the exchange
- Block trading on the U.S. platform
- Use of event contracts for investment strategies
- Interest in prediction markets as risk-management tools
Block Trades Could Be One Piece of the Plan
Polymarket's U.S. exchange doesn't currently have the same publicly confirmed block-trading capability. CNBC reported that brokers representing some early institutional participants have discussed executing block trades through the U.S. exchange and that Polymarket is close to having that capability available.
The company declined to comment on where that process currently stands. Still, adding someone specifically responsible for institutional growth makes the direction pretty clear, even if all the infrastructure isn't there yet.
Polymarket Keeps Building Out its Leadership Team
Mantil isn't arriving by herself. Polymarket has been adding experienced executives as it builds beyond the retail-focused platform many traders already know. Earlier in September, Polymarket named Warren Jenson its first chief financial officer. Jenson previously held senior finance roles at companies including Amazon, Delta Air Lines, and Nielsen.
The company has also brought former Zora CEO Jacob Horne aboard to lead its DeFi product efforts. Those hires come after Polymarket officially launched its U.S. exchange in May. The company is now valued at around $21 billion following a $1 billion fundraising round that included 1789 Capital and Intercontinental Exchange.
The Trade Handle Prediction Markets Take
The interesting part of this hire isn't simply that Polymarket landed someone from Goldman Sachs. It's what Polymarket wants Mantil to do once she's there. Prediction markets have proven they can attract huge numbers of individual traders.
Bringing institutions into the market at scale is a very different challenge, requiring relationships, infrastructure, and products designed for much larger positions. Mantil spent nearly three decades working inside that world. Now we'll get to see whether some of Wall Street follows her into prediction markets.