Sean Strickland beat Khamzat Chimaev by split decision Saturday night in Newark to reclaim the UFC middleweight title. On Kalshi, the fight drew $51.8 million in contract volume and $19.0 million in actual cash exchanged across more than 280,000 trades.
Most of the trades backed Chimaev, including the biggest individual contracts too. The closer to the final bell, the more lopsided it got.
Pre-fight, Strickland’s side led — 54% to 46% through the week leading up to the fight. Once the fight window opened on Saturday night, Chimaev’s share grew with each passing hour.
When the scorecards came back split for Strickland at roughly 12:45 a.m. ET, $11.1 million of trades backing Chimaev settled at zero.
Per-Minute Trades on Chimaev vs. Strickland (UFC 328 Fight Hour)
The 20 largest trades were all on Chimaev
Per trade tapes, the top 20 executions amounted to $761,241, all on Chimaev. Thirteen of the twenty fell inside the fight window from the table above — between 11:00 p.m. ET on May 9 and the 12:45 a.m. resolution on May 10. The single biggest individual trade on the entire fight — $68,588 on Chimaev at 11:48 p.m. ET, fifty-six minutes before the contract resolved — went to zero.
Top 20 trades on the fight by trade size:
| Rank | Time (ET) | Backed | $ Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | May 9 11:48 p.m. | Chimaev | $68,588 |
| 2 | May 10 12:07 a.m. | Chimaev | $54,624 |
| 3 | May 9 11:35 p.m. | Chimaev | $43,010 |
| 4 | May 9 9:27 p.m. | Chimaev | $40,500 |
| 5 | May 9 8:16 a.m. | Chimaev | $40,500 |
| 6 | May 9 4:45 a.m. | Chimaev | $40,500 |
| 7 | May 9 11:16 p.m. | Chimaev | $40,000 |
| 8 | May 6 1:07 p.m. | Chimaev | $40,000 |
| 9 | May 9 11:18 p.m. | Chimaev | $39,375 |
| 10 | May 9 11:34 p.m. | Chimaev | $39,290 |
| 11 | May 6 12:39 a.m. | Chimaev | $39,048 |
| 12 | May 9 11:51 p.m. | Chimaev | $39,024 |
| 13 | May 9 11:40 p.m. | Chimaev | $39,024 |
| 14 | May 9 9:29 p.m. | Chimaev | $32,400 |
| 15 | May 9 11:25 p.m. | Chimaev | $32,000 |
| 16 | May 9 8:16 p.m. | Chimaev | $29,288 |
| 17 | May 9 11:16 p.m. | Chimaev | $28,608 |
| 18 | May 10 12:11 a.m. | Chimaev | $27,297 |
| 19 | May 10 12:06 a.m. | Chimaev | $24,390 |
| 20 | May 9 11:47 p.m. | Chimaev | $23,776 |
The second-biggest trade, $54,624 on Chimaev, was placed at 12:07 a.m. ET, thirty-seven minutes before resolution.
On the Strickland side, the biggest trades were a fraction of that. The two largest by cash — $13,720 and $10,334 — both hit the tape six seconds after the contract resolved. Those were closing trades, not money on Strickland winning.
The biggest trade backing Strickland that came in before the result was $10,000 at 9:54 p.m. ET — 50,000 contracts at $0.20 each, which paid out $50,000 when Strickland won. An identical $10,000 setup hit the tape earlier the same evening at 6:47 p.m. ET.
Fifteen separate Chimaev trades came in over $30,000 each. The biggest single trade on Chimaev was nearly seven times the size of the biggest single trade on Strickland.
$1.24 million traded on Chimaev in the final four minutes
In the four minutes before the contract resolved, Kalshi pricessed $1.24 million backing Chimaev. $282,000 flowed in backing Strickland — a 4.4-to-1 imbalance.
The single largest minute of pro-Chimaev cash flow on the entire seven-day market — $472,000 in sixty seconds — was 12:42 a.m. ET. The contract resolved three minutes later, with Strickland the winner.
Kalshi’s trade data doesn’t include account information, so we can’t count how many specific people were trying to sell back Chimaev. In the final 10 minutes, 5,728 trades worth $962,000 went onto Chimaev’s side; 3,412 trades worth $181,000 went the other way.
The cards came back 48-47 Strickland, 47-48 Chimaev, 48-47 Strickland — a split decision and a new champion. Right up to the bell, more money was going on Chimaev than coming off.
In the next four minutes, the market processed 23,418 closing trades. Strickland-side contracts settled at $1.00. Chimaev-side contracts settled at $0.
Seven days of trading, $19.0 million in cash, a total of $52 million in notional volume:
- $11.1 million on Chimaev. All of it lost.
- $7.9 million on Strickland. All of it paid out.
Per yesterday’s numbers, traders had Strickland as a four-to-one underdog, and the Kalshi trade tapes continued to run in the same direction.
