Novig, a sports-focused prediction market, has reportedly quadrupled its valuation to $2 billion after it targeted young men with racy ads featuring actress Sydney Sweeney posing fully nude with strategically placed sports gear.
The prediction market – a smaller competitor to platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket, which rival traditional sportsbooks – raised new funding at a $2 billion valuation, up from a $500 million valuation earlier this year, the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.
Novig had built a small audience from its podcast and clinched a partnership with the New York Mets, but the platform took off after the “Euphoria” actress signed on as an equity investor and posed in her birthday suit for the company’s ads, which went viral online.
“Think you know sports? Prove it,” Sweeney says in the commercial. “No betting on wars, or deaths, and no politics. Just you, your takes and sports.”
Sweeney then shows off all the sports that traders can bet on, leaving little to the imagination: posing fully nude with two footballs covering her chest, then sitting atop a basketball hoop and then with a soccer ball held up by her feet.
At one point, she lies on a felt billiards table, quipping, “You can’t trade this. I just look good here.”
The ads – which showed Sweeney covered just enough to be legally distributed on airwaves – fueled online backlash from critics who objected to the sexualization of women in sports and accused the commercial of reducing female athletes to their appearance.
Sweeney lost over 200,000 Instagram followers after the commercial was released, according to Variety, though she still boasts nearly 26 million followers total.
British sprinter Amy Hunt, Australian swimmer Ariarne Titmus – a four-time Olympic gold medalist – and American gymnast Gracie Kramer each hit back at Sweeney’s eyebrow-raising ad, filming themselves excelling in their sport to show “what women’s sport looks like!”
Former Fox News host-turned-podcaster Megyn Kelly and Republican Rep. Nancy Mace of South Carolina defended Sweeney, arguing that advertisers have long used sex appeal to market products to men.
The star doubled down on the commercial, posting several photos of athletes posing nude on her Instagram account, including a series of sports magazine covers – though critics argued those covers were a different matter since the women posing were real athletes.
Novig CEO Jacob Fortinsky also stood by the ads, saying the company is “hugely supportive of women’s sports” and they “never intended to portray female sports.”
“It really was Sydney who’s driving a lot of the visuals and the messaging,” he said.
“Sydney’s an actress,” Fortinsky added. “We’re a prediction market that’s focused on sports, and that was the story she was communicating.”
Investors have been rushing to back prediction markets, even as the controversial betting platforms – which typically allow users to gamble on everything from sports to pop culture and politics – face regulatory concerns.
Critics have argued that prediction markets operate via loopholes that evade state gambling rules and taxes. The platforms have also faced backlash over alleged insider trading and for offering bets related to terrorism and war, which opponents have warned could act as an incentive for violence.
Most of the new capital for Novig came from existing investors, according to the Wall Street Journal. The platform’s earlier investors include venture-capital firms Pantera Capital, Multicoin Capital and NFX.
Sweeney has a history of ruffling feathers with her controversial ads.
Her “great jeans” spots with teen retailer American Eagle last year stoked backlash online, as some enraged critics bizarrely accused the commercial of promoting Nazi-style eugenics. But the campaign also brought in a million new customers to stores.
Sweeney also partnered with men’s skin care brand Dr. Squatch on a limited-edition soap called “Sydney’s Bathwater Bliss.”