Polymarket ventures into stocks and commodities trading using Pyth Network data
The platform now offers price-dependent contracts for equities and commodities, leveraging Pyth Network's data infrastructure to serve as the automated settlement mechanism for contract outcomes.
The prediction platform Polymarket has introduced new trading markets connected to stocks, commodities and exchange-traded funds, utilizing pricing information from blockchain oracle service Pyth Network as the settlement mechanism to establish results for contracts that run on a daily basis.
These newly launched markets feature daily directional predictions and end-of-day price contracts covering prominent stock indices, commodity assets like gold and crude oil, and a selection of publicly traded American companies, with results automatically determined through Pyth's live pricing infrastructure. Each contract cycle concludes when the trading session ends.
The announcement reveals that the new service encompasses over twelve publicly traded US stocks, featuring companies like Tesla, Nvidia and Apple, in addition to various commodities and stock market indices.
Through designating Pyth as the settlement infrastructure for these trading markets, Polymarket is replacing manual processes or exchange-dependent data points with a unified data provider that aggregates information from multiple trading firms and market makers.
Pyth, based in Zug, Switzerland, announced it has also introduced a data visualization tool named Pyth Terminal, enabling users to monitor real-time pricing information and the benchmark values employed to determine market outcomes on Polymarket. Market participants can observe a continuously updating "price to beat" that adjusts in real-time as financial markets fluctuate.
The Polymarket platform enables participants to place wagers on the results of actual global events, including athletic competitions, political elections, financial market movements and meteorological conditions, with agreements settling based on the fulfillment of predetermined criteria.
In the previous week, Intercontinental Exchange, which serves as the parent organization of the New York Stock Exchange, announced the completion of a $600 million cash investment in Polymarket and indicated plans to purchase as much as an additional $40 million worth of shares from current shareholders as a component of a larger multibillion-dollar investment strategy in the platform.
Oracles expand beyond crypto into real-world data infrastructure
Data oracle networks, which deliver off-blockchain information including asset prices, currency exchange rates and commodity valuations to blockchain systems, are broadening their scope beyond cryptocurrency applications into financial services, governmental functions and prediction market implementations.
The function of these networks has started to reach into official information systems, with both Chainlink and Pyth Network being chosen by United States federal agencies to publish economic statistics onchain, covering metrics like GDP and inflation measurements. This announcement propelled the PYTH (PYTH) token upward by more than 70% within that trading day, pushing its total market capitalization beyond the $1 billion threshold.
This development arrives as oracle service providers are being deployed to support prediction market platforms and real-world event information, with RedStone incorporating data from Kalshi, a CFTC-regulated platform, across more than 110 different blockchain networks in October.
These oracle providers are also assuming an increasingly significant function in linking cryptocurrency platforms to conventional financial market infrastructure. During January, Chainlink announced plans to deploy 24/5 pricing data covering US equities and ETFs to cryptocurrency platforms, facilitating trading activities, lending services and derivative instruments connected to tokenized stock assets outside of traditional market operating hours.
In the subsequent month, Ondo Finance revealed that it had incorporated Chainlink as the information provider for tokenized United States equities on its Ondo Global Markets platform, where the pricing feeds support lending operations and collateralization processes.
Information from DeFiLlama reveals a heavily concentrated oracle service market, with Chainlink representing approximately 64% of the total value secured across the sector. Alternative providers, including RedStone and Pyth Network, control considerably smaller market segments at roughly 5% each.
