/markets/event-contract

What is an event contract?

An event contract is a financial contract on a stated outcome, traded on a CFTC-regulated exchange. It is priced between 1¢ and 99¢ and settles at exactly $1.00 if the outcome occurs, or at zero if it doesn't.

The price is set by an order book of other traders, not by a bookmaker — a 63¢ price is simply where buyers and sellers currently meet. You can trade out of a position before settlement.

Worked example

A $100.00 stake at 63¢ buys about 158.7 contracts, worth $158.73 at settlement before any declared exchange fee (63.0% implied). Fee treatment varies by venue — some include the fee in the quoted price, some deduct it from winnings at settlement — and our tables always order by the net figure.

Illustrative numbers computed with the same conversion math our comparison tables use. Prices move — confirm the number at the platform before you bet.

How a prediction market handles it

The sportsbook analog of a game-outcome event contract is the moneyline: same position, different unit. The structural differences are the counterparty (an order book of traders versus the house), the quoting unit (cents versus American odds), and where the cost sits (a declared fee versus margin inside the odds).