Three weeks out from the midterms, one of Kalshi’s steadiest political contracts just picked up a clear signal: Donald Trump’s approval rating heading into Friday, October 16. The line has been climbing since the weekend, and traders are reading it as a genuine shift rather than noise.
Before we dive in, grab a Kalshi promo code, download the Action Network app for more picks and analysis, and don't forget to check our midterms predictions so you don’t miss new movements before Election Day.
If you want more Action Network content, be sure to add us as a preferred source on Google.
Trump's Approval Rating on Kalshi
A prediction market isn’t a poll. It’s a live price shaped by people putting real money behind what they expect to happen, which means it reacts to news the moment traders see it rather than waiting for the next survey to publish. For a recurring contract like this one, that price resets every week against wherever the public conversation currently sits.
Don't forget to check out our Kalshi review and visit Prediction Pro if you want more prediction market content.
A Market Trending Up, Against a Mixed Polling Picture
This week’s contract has moved in one direction since it opened: up. It wasn’t a single jump tied to one headline: it’s been a steady grind higher through Wednesday, enough to shift the contract’s favored range noticeably from where the week started.
That climb sits awkwardly next to the raw polling. National averages compiled from outlets including The New York Times, NBC News and Real Clear Politics had Trump sitting in the mid-to-upper 30s as of October 8, while a Pew Research reading from the same week put him level with the weakest point of his entire first term, the numbers he was posting right before he left office in January 2021.
A market trending up while part of the polling keeps sliding is exactly the kind of gap that creates an opening, positioning here is a call on which signal wins out by Friday morning.
What’s Pushing the Number This Week
A few threads line up with the timing, and the biggest one is foreign policy.
On Thursday, Trump posted that the US “will not be attacking Iran at any time prior to the Midterm Elections,” citing ongoing talks with Tehran. The post followed months of a conflict that began in February and has weighed on his numbers ever since: a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found roughly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of how he’s handled it. To markets, framing the pause around diplomacy reads as a de-escalation signal rather than a retreat.
Two smaller factors line up alongside it:
- No shutdown competing for headlines. Congress funded the government into December back in early September, so unlike this time last year, there’s no furlough story eating into coverage of the president.
- A visible campaign push. Trump has kept up a busy rally schedule into the final stretch: stops in San Antonio and Mobile, Alabama in the past week alone, the kind of visibility that tends to show up in enthusiasm numbers before it moves a topline figure.
Before Friday Settles It
A single rough poll landing before the resolution check could erase the week’s climb just as fast as it built. That’s the appeal of trading a contract like this one so close to resolution: the price is still absorbing information that a traditional poll won’t catch for days. If you’ve been watching the gap between the market and the headlines, this is the window to act on it before Friday settles the question.
