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How to play The King Panda
FutureSports has inked a deal with Major League Baseball (MLB) to launch performance-based financial indexes for all 30 MLB franchises, marking the company’s latest expansion into professional sports markets.
As part of the accord, MLB will supply FutureSports with official league data “that the company will use to create new broad-based CME FutureSports Performance Indexes (FSPI)” on each MLB team. Financial terms of the agreement weren’t disclosed.
CME Group (NASDAQ: CME) and the index provider announced a partnership in July. With the MLB deal in place, the exchange operator will offer derivatives based on the baseball indexes.
How to play The King Panda
The research firm estimates that by 2035, financial derivatives, including event contracts linked to commodities, cryptocurrencies and stocks, will account for 49% of turnover on yes/no exchanges, topping sports to become the largest volume driver. The research firm sees event contracts tied to key performance indicators (KPIs) leading the charge.
“We expect new products such as KPI markets, which allow users to trade a single corporate metric, such as production, deliveries, or subscriber growth, rather than the stock price itself,” observe the analysts. “Further, perp futures are expanding from crypto to commodities and single stock perps.”
Some exchange operators already filed plans to introduce KPI-linked event contracts. Those derivatives would be tied to metrics such as corporate earnings or, in more nuanced cases, Apple iPhone shipments or Tesla deliveries — just two examples — in a given quarter.
How to play The King Panda
He nevertheless believes recruitment is still the bigger challenge over retention.
“The gaming industry operates in a highly competitive talent market, particularly for digital, technology, data, AI and product roles,” he says.
Skinner also says perceptions of the industry can hinder recruitment.
