tarek mansour

Tarek Mansour is an American entrepreneur and the co‑founder and CEO of Kalshi, a federally regulated U.S. exchange where people trade on the outcomes of real‑world events (like elections, inflation numbers, or economic data releases).

Who is Tarek Mansour?

• Co‑founder and CEO of Kalshi , an event‑contracts exchange approved as a Designated Contract Market (DCM) by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

• Known for pushing prediction markets into the financial mainstream by allowing users to directly trade on “yes/no” questions about future events.

• Active online presence (including X/Twitter), where he leans into a sharp, confident communication style and often posts short, punchy lines about markets and risk‑taking (for example, “Trust the market.” in November 2024).

Early life and education

• Born in California and raised in Lebanon before returning to the U.S. for university.

• Studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), earning degrees in Computer Science, Mathematics, and an Engineering master’s, and was involved in elite honor societies such as Tau Beta Pi and Eta Kappa Nu.

• Participated in Y Combinator after MIT, which helped launch Kalshi as a venture‑backed startup.

Career before Kalshi

• Worked as a quantitative trader and analyst at major financial institutions, including Goldman Sachs (structured credit and equities) and Citadel (global macro trading).

• Also held technical roles such as forward‑deployed engineer and research assistant in data‑heavy, analytical environments, blending engineering and markets.

• During these roles, he noticed that a lot of complex trading was really about simple questions on future events (for example, “Will inflation be above X?”), which inspired the concept of a dedicated event‑marketplace.

Kalshi and why he’s trending

• Kalshi was founded in 2018 and received CFTC approval as a DCM in 2020, making it one of the first federally regulated prediction‑style exchanges focused on event contracts.

• The platform launched in 2021 and has since expanded to markets on macroeconomics, politics, and other real‑world outcomes, positioning itself as a “market for everything.”

• Under Mansour’s leadership, Kalshi has raised hundreds of millions from major venture firms and is cited as a highly innovative U.S. fintech company in the event‑trading space.

Public persona and forum buzz

• Described in profiles as “redefining how people think about markets,” with a style that mixes data‑driven seriousness and media‑friendly storytelling.

• On social platforms, he brands himself as an MIT math and markets nerd, attracting followers interested in macro, trading, and startup execution.

• Interviews and podcasts often frame him as a younger founder trying to disrupt traditional finance by making event‑based trading accessible to a broader audience.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.