Luana Lopes Lara is a Brazilian-born entrepreneur and computer scientist known as the co-founder of the prediction market platform, Kalshi. In December 2025, she gained international recognition after becoming the world's youngest female self-made billionaire at the age of 29 following a significant funding round for her company. ^[1]

Education

Lopes Lara attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where she earned a degree in Computer Science. During her time at the university, she met Tarek Mansour, who would later become her business partner and co-founder of Kalshi. ^[1]​

Career

Early Career and Research

Before establishing Kalshi, Lopes Lara built a diverse background through various roles in academia and industry. During her time at MIT, she was an undergraduate researcher at the MIT Media Lab (2014-2015), a teaching assistant at the School of Engineering (2016), and a researcher at both the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) (2016-2018) and the Brain and Cognitive Sciences department (2018-2019). She also gained experience in the corporate and financial sectors with positions in business development at Anheuser-Busch InBev, participation in a startup accelerator at ZX Ventures, a software engineering role at Bridgewater Associates, and quantitative trading internships at Five Rings Capital and Citadel Securities.

Kalshi

In 2019, Lopes Lara co-founded Kalshi with fellow MIT graduate Tarek Mansour. Kalshi operates as a financial exchange focused on prediction markets, which are markets created for the purpose of trading on the outcomes of future events. The platform is designed to allow users to trade on the anticipated results of real-world events through the mechanism of event-based contracts. ^[1]​

A critical milestone for the company came in November 2020, when it received formal registration as a Designated Contract Market (DCM) from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). This regulatory approval was a key step that authorized Kalshi to operate and offer its event-based contracts to users in the United States, solidifying its position as a regulated entity in the financial markets. ^[1]​

Recognition

Lopes Lara's success with Kalshi led to significant financial milestones and public recognition.

Youngest Female Self-Made Billionaire

In December 2025, at the age of 29, Lopes Lara became the world's youngest female self-made billionaire. With this achievement, she surpassed previous titleholders, including Scale AI co-founder Lucy Guo and musician Taylor Swift. Her co-founder, Tarek Mansour, also became a billionaire as a result of the same valuation event. ^[1]​

2025 Funding Round

Lopes Lara's billionaire status was the direct result of a successful Series C funding round for Kalshi in December 2025. The round raised 11 billion. The investment was led by the venture capital firm Paradigm. Other notable investors that participated in the round included Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), and Y Combinator, all of whom had previously invested in the company. ^[1]​