Exclusive: Onyx Odds raises $20M led by Kraken parent Payward
Illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios
Onyx Odds, a sports prediction app that's expanding into other trading products, raised $20 million at a $220 million post-money valuation, CEO Leul Dadi tells Axios exclusively.
Why it matters: Sports prediction apps keep moving closer to financial market infrastructure.
Zoom in: Kraken parent Payward led the Series A round as a strategic investor and infrastructure partner.
- Other investors include Xfund and Breyer Capital.
- The round brings Onyx's total funding to about $30 million.
How it works: NYC-based Onyx started with sports predictions as a free-to-play app, but it aims to become a consumer broker for sports and other event-driven trading products.
- Onyx will begin by piloting event-contract trading using regulated derivatives infrastructure through its Payward partnership, Dadi says.
- That infrastructure will help Onyx offer prediction markets, perpetual futures and crypto trading in the app.
- Onyx expects brokerage fees to become its main revenue source as it moves into regulated trading products.
State of play: Dadi says Onyx has about 800,000 users after coming out of beta in August 2025 and is already profitable.
Between the lines: Onyx sees the brokerage front end as the most valuable layer.
- Dadi says the company does not want to become a designated contract market (DCM), but instead plans to take a Robinhood-like approach by offering multiple products through a single consumer app.
- Partnering with Payward gives Onyx the infrastructure it would otherwise need to build, buy or assemble through other vendors.
- "The funding is motivated by the partnership itself," Dadi says.
The bottom line: Onyx's next phase will test how far a sports-first audience follows the company into broader trading products.
