ROOT

Our Philosophy

Today's sportsbook and gaming products are largely built around a predatory economic model. Their analytics, marketing, and product design are optimized primarily for two outcomes: maximizing deposits and maximizing player losses. In practice, this creates an adversarial relationship between the platform and its own users. It is a commonly known — and shockingly accepted — practice that traditional sportsbooks will simply ban users from their platform if they win too much. At its core, this is the product of a fundamentally misaligned relationship between platform and customer.

ROOT is being built from a fundamentally different set of incentives. Our goal is not to extract losses from fans, but to build a social infrastructure that increases engagement with the sport itself. The product is designed to maximize attention, participation, fairness, and long-term enjoyment of the game.

In other words, ROOT exists to make watching sports more interactive, social, and meaningful for fans — with a business model where the platform succeeds when fans are engaged, not when they lose.

Executive Summary

ROOT is a social sports infrastructure platform that makes watching games more interactive, competitive, and community-driven. Fans form groups, compete on leaderboards, make predictions on game outcomes — both individually and together through pooled predictions — and share the experience with friends through an intuitive mobile app.

ROOT does not operate as a sportsbook, does not set odds, does not hold user funds, and does not act as a counterparty to any wager. ROOT is the social layer — groups, leaderboards, pooled predictions, and community features — built on top of existing, federally regulated market infrastructure operated by a CFTC-regulated Designated Contract Market (DCM).

ROOT's revenue model is a small platform fee on transactions — functionally equivalent to the service fees charged by social entertainment platforms — in exchange for the curated fan experience the platform provides. All settlement, fund custody, and market operations are handled entirely by the regulated exchange and its on-chain settlement infrastructure partner DFlow, with full transparency and regulatory oversight. For pooled predictions, a Solana smart contract acts as a transparent, non-custodial escrow — ROOT never holds or manages pooled funds at any point.

Founding Team

What ROOT Is — And What It Is Not

What ROOT Is

• A social sports infrastructure platform where fans form groups, compete on leaderboards, and share predictions with friends around professional sports events — making games more interactive and community-driven
• A fan engagement layer that connects users to CFTC-regulated market infrastructure operated by a licensed Designated Contract Market — the social experience is the product, the regulated rails are the backend
• A community product — the core value proposition is the social experience: groups, rivalries, streaks, leaderboards, pooled group predictions, and shared moments around games fans already care about
• A pooled predictions platform — groups of friends can collectively pool contributions on a shared prediction, with a Solana smart contract handling escrow, aggregation, and proportional settlement. This is the digital version of friends pooling on a game together — automated, transparent, and trustless
• A platform that charges a small service fee for the social and entertainment experience it provides, similar to how platforms like Ticketmaster, StubHub, or fantasy sports platforms charge service/platform fees

What ROOT Is Not

• ROOT is not a sportsbook. It does not set odds, does not create or manage betting lines, and does not determine payouts
• ROOT does not hold, custody, or manage user funds at any point in the transaction lifecycle — including in pooled predictions, where a smart contract (not ROOT) serves as the escrow
• ROOT does not act as a counterparty to any prediction or wager. Users are transacting on a federally regulated exchange
• ROOT does not operate a gambling operation. All underlying market activity occurs on a CFTC-regulated Designated Contract Market, subject to federal regulatory oversight, compliance requirements, and market integrity standards
• ROOT does not create proprietary contracts. All available markets are created, listed, and governed by the exchange under CFTC oversight

Scope of Activity — Sports-Only Binary Outcomes

ROOT is intentionally limited to binary outcome predictions on professional sports events — for example, "Will Ohio State beat Michigan in the College Football Playoff?" or "Will the Super Bowl total score be over/under 48.5 points?"

This is a deliberate product and integrity decision. Binary sports outcomes represent the most transparent, least manipulable category because:

• Outcomes are publicly determined by professional referees and league-sanctioned official scoring
• League integrity offices actively monitor for manipulation across all major professional sports
• Federal and state oversight provides additional layers of fraud prevention
• Institutional incentive alignment — leagues, broadcasters, sponsors, and teams all have massive financial incentives to ensure game integrity
• No exposure to exotic or manipulable propositions — ROOT does not and will not offer prop bets, individual performance wagers, or non-sports event contracts that carry higher manipulation risk

This sports-only approach specifically avoids the categories that have drawn regulatory and ethical scrutiny — political outcome betting, celebrity/social media propositions, and other non-sports contracts where information asymmetry and manipulation risks are materially higher.

How It Works — Technical Architecture

Understanding the technical architecture is important because it demonstrates that ROOT's role is limited to providing the social interface. The actual financial infrastructure — market operations, order matching, fund custody, and settlement — is handled entirely by regulated third parties.

The Technology Stack

Step-by-Step User Transaction Flow

1. User opens ROOT and sees this week's college football games displayed with their friend groups, leaderboard standings, and community activity
2. User selects a prediction — e.g., "Ohio State to beat Michigan" — through ROOT's social interface
3. ROOT sends the order to DFlow's Trading API, which routes it to the exchange's regulated order book for execution
4. The exchange matches the order against its liquidity. The user's funds go directly to the exchange's CFTC-mandated segregated customer accounts — ROOT never touches, holds, or routes through user funds
5. DFlow mints an SPL token on the Solana blockchain representing the user's prediction position. This token sits in the user's own wallet as a verifiable, transparent record of their position
6. The game is played. ROOT provides the social experience — group chat, live leaderboard updates, friendly competition
7. The game ends. The exchange determines the official outcome. DFlow automatically settles: winning tokens are redeemed for USDC sent directly to the user's wallet. Losing tokens are burned. ROOT does not participate in settlement
8. Leaderboards update. The user's prediction record, streak, and group standings reflect the result

Pooled Predictions — Technical Architecture

In addition to individual predictions, ROOT enables group pooled predictions — a core social feature where a group of friends collectively pools contributions on a shared outcome, with fully automated, transparent settlement.

How Pooled Predictions Work

1. A user creates a Pool — selects a market (e.g., "Ohio State beats Michigan"), sets a lock time (e.g., 5 minutes before kickoff), and shares it to their group
2. Group members opt in — each contributing any amount they choose. All contributions go directly to a Solana smart contract that serves as the pool escrow
3. Pool locks at cutoff — the smart contract aggregates all contributions and routes a single order through DFlow's Trading API to the exchange's regulated order book
4. The game plays out — ROOT provides the social experience: group chat, live pool value updates, group leaderboard activity
5. The game ends — the exchange determines the official outcome. The smart contract automatically settles: each contributor receives their proportional share of winnings directly to their wallet. Losing pool tokens are burned. ROOT does not participate in settlement at any point

Critical Distinctions for Pooled Predictions

• The smart contract is the escrow — not ROOT. ROOT's role is limited to providing the social interface for creating, joining, and viewing pools
• ROOT never holds, touches, or routes pooled funds. Funds flow: user wallet → smart contract → DFlow/exchange → smart contract → user wallet. ROOT is not in the fund flow
• All pool activity is on-chain — every contribution, every aggregated order, and every settlement distribution is recorded on the Solana blockchain, providing a fully transparent, publicly verifiable, immutable record
• The underlying prediction still executes on a CFTC-regulated exchange — the pool mechanic is a social aggregation layer, not a new market or betting structure
• Pooled predictions are functionally equivalent to a group of friends each independently placing the same prediction — the smart contract simply automates the coordination, removes the need for a trusted intermediary, and ensures transparent, proportional settlement

What ROOT Handles vs. What ROOT Does Not

The Fee Structure

ROOT charges a small transaction fee when a user places a prediction through the platform. This fee is the platform's revenue model and is functionally comparable to:

• The convenience fees charged by ticketing platforms (Ticketmaster, SeatGeek) for access to their marketplace
• The platform fees charged by social trading apps (Robinhood, Public) for access to their interface

It is worth noting how ROOT's fee model differs from fantasy sports platforms like DraftKings and FanDuel. Those platforms also charge entry fees, but they operate guaranteed prize pools (GPPs) — meaning the platform commits to paying out a fixed prize amount regardless of how many users enter a contest. If a GPP doesn't fill, the platform absorbs the shortfall (known as "overlay"). This creates fill-rate exposure — DraftKings and FanDuel take on financial risk tied to contest participation levels. While DFS platforms do not have directional exposure to contest outcomes (they earn their rake regardless of who wins), they do absorb risk that ROOT never does. Additionally, DraftKings and FanDuel also operate sportsbook products where they act as the direct counterparty to wagers — setting lines, taking the other side of bets, and carrying directional exposure to game outcomes.

ROOT's model is fundamentally different from both. ROOT does not create contests, does not guarantee prize pools, does not absorb fill-rate risk, does not operate a sportsbook, and does not take the other side of any prediction. ROOT has zero financial exposure — directional or otherwise — to the outcome of any prediction or the participation level of any pool. ROOT earns the same flat fee regardless of whether the user wins or loses, and regardless of how many users participate. The fee is compensation for the social platform, curated experience, and community infrastructure that ROOT provides — not a gambling rake, vig, or house edge.

Even in pooled predictions, this distinction holds: the smart contract escrow handles all fund aggregation and settlement automatically. ROOT does not guarantee pool sizes, does not subsidize pools, and does not participate in settlement. There is no scenario in which ROOT's financial outcome is affected by the result of a sporting event.

Separately, the exchange's standard fees apply to the underlying market transaction, as they would for any user accessing the exchange through any interface.

Relationship with Exchange Infrastructure Partners

ROOT's relationship with its exchange infrastructure partner would be as an API integration partner — similar to how a third-party app might access a stock exchange's markets through an authorized API. The exchange provides the regulated market infrastructure; ROOT provides a specialized fan engagement experience for a specific audience (sports fans). ROOT would not have a joint venture, equity relationship, or co-management arrangement with the exchange. The relationship would be a technology integration and a standard revenue-sharing arrangement for third-party applications that route volume to the exchange.

DFlow provides the on-chain settlement middleware — the technical infrastructure that tokenizes the exchange's contracts onto the Solana blockchain and enables the transparent, non-custodial settlement described above. ROOT integrates with DFlow's Trading API and Metadata API. This is a technology integration, not a joint venture or co-management arrangement.

ROOT is currently evaluating potential exchange partners and has not yet entered into a formal agreement with a specific CFTC-regulated Designated Contract Market. The key requirement is that any exchange partner operates under full federal regulatory oversight.

The Fantasy Sports Precedent

The NBA has an established history of partnership and investment in fantasy sports platforms, including DraftKings and FanDuel, which involve fans engaging with sports outcomes and staking real money on those engagements.

ROOT's model is arguably more constrained and more transparent than daily fantasy sports:

The pooled predictions feature is particularly relevant to the fantasy sports comparison. DFS platforms like DraftKings and FanDuel operate guaranteed prize pools where the platform itself acts as counterparty if the pool doesn't fill — meaning the platform has direct financial exposure to outcomes. ROOT's pooled predictions are structurally safer: the smart contract is the escrow (not ROOT), the pool only executes if contributions are made (no platform guarantee), and settlement is automated and on-chain. ROOT has zero financial exposure to the outcome of any pool.

If the NBA is comfortable with its existing fantasy sports partnerships — where platforms hold user funds, create their own contest structures, and sometimes act as counterparty in guaranteed prize pools — ROOT's model represents a more regulated, more transparent, and lower-risk version of the same fundamental activity: fans engaging with sports in social, interactive ways.

Why This Matters — The Market Context

Fan engagement with sports is evolving rapidly. The next generation of fans expects interactive, social, real-time experiences around the games they watch — not passive viewership. Fantasy sports proved that fans want to have skin in the game. Social media proved that fans want to experience games together. ROOT sits at the intersection of both trends.

The question is not whether fans will engage with sports through social platforms that include predictions — they already are, at scale, through a fragmented landscape of offshore platforms, unregulated apps, and traditional sportsbooks designed to maximize player losses. The question is whether that engagement happens through products built around fan experience and community, on regulated and transparent infrastructure, or through the existing alternatives that prioritize extraction over engagement.

ROOT's thesis is that a social-first platform built on top of CFTC-regulated infrastructure represents the most responsible, most transparent, and most fan-friendly way to serve this demand — and that the social experience (not the wagering) is what creates lasting engagement and differentiation.

Summary