A groundbreaking new player has emerged in the world of sports betting—not a person, but an artificial intelligence agent named Billy Bets. This AI, built to operate on the blockchain, is aiming to revolutionize the traditional tipster industry, a market long shrouded in opacity and dubious claims. Backed by both crypto capital and celebrity investors, Billy is on a mission to make sports betting more transparent, traceable, and intelligent.
A Tectonic Shift in Sports Tipster Culture
The sports tipster industry—populated by so-called “experts” who charge for betting advice—is massive, with estimates from Business Research Insights valuing it at nearly $149 billion globally. Yet despite its size, the industry is rife with skepticism, owing to unverifiable track records and questionable sales tactics. Many customers pay for predictions with little insight into the actual success rate or methodology behind them.
Enter Billy Bets. This AI-driven agent isn’t just picking winners; it’s broadcasting every move publicly on the blockchain. That means wins and losses, strategies, and the very logic behind each wager are visible and verifiable in real time. It’s this radical transparency that’s drawing attention.
Recently, Billy secured $1 million in pre-seed funding, attracting investment from major names including Coinbase Ventures, NBA champion Serge Ibaka, and CMS Holdings. Even executives from Decrypt’s parent company participated in the round, signaling industry-wide interest in the project’s promise.
Built for Transparency and Performance
Billy is far more than a betting bot. The AI operates using a stack of finely tuned models that include OpenAI tools for data embedding and memory recall, Claude models for reasoning capabilities, and Grok for persona and interaction. These models are customized and orchestrated under a proprietary research framework developed by Billy’s creators, and that framework continues to evolve.
CEO and co-founder Joseph O’Rourke says the idea was born out of frustration with the betting world’s lack of openness. After spending years betting professionally—and being banned by sportsbooks for being too successful—he set out to create an AI agent that could not only bet smarter but also prove every claim it made.
Billy’s results so far speak to its potential: it correctly forecasted the Kentucky Derby winner, made it to the Elite Eight in March Madness, and picked the champion of the Masters Tournament. While those headline wins are impressive, Billy also offers complete visibility into its missteps, such as current underperformance in NBA and MLB bets, where the AI has posted negative returns.
The Blockchain Edge
What sets Billy apart is its full immersion in the on-chain ecosystem. All activity occurs on public blockchain networks, giving users complete access to its betting history and strategies. Unlike conventional sportsbooks that operate behind closed doors, Billy can observe the full flow of bets in real time through decentralized exchanges.
“Billy watches every bet being placed and uses that data to make decisions,” O’Rourke explained. “It’s like having backend access to a platform like DraftKings—something you could never get in a centralized betting environment.”
The agent’s decentralized nature also allows for more sophisticated trading strategies. Billy isn’t limited to placing a single bet and waiting for the outcome. Instead, it can buy, sell, or hedge positions dynamically, adapting to real-time odds and market sentiment—something traditional sportsbooks don’t permit.
Public Performance and Portfolio Tracking
Billy’s performance is updated and accessible via the soon-to-launch Billy Terminal, currently entering open beta. This interface allows users to view detailed breakdowns of the AI’s picks by sport, as well as its overall return on investment (ROI). While Billy boasts an 82% ROI in golf, it’s currently down around 3.7% overall due to weaker results in other categories.
That said, these figures still compare favorably to human competitors. By contrast, even the best traditional handicappers rarely achieve an ROI above 2.3%, according to BoydBets.
The Billy Terminal doesn’t just show picks; it also gives each prediction a “conviction score” to signal the agent’s confidence. Users can chat directly with the AI to understand the rationale behind each recommendation, and soon, they’ll be able to place wagers through integrated platforms like Polymarket, Myriad Markets, and Overtime Markets—all within the interface.
A Glimpse at the Future
Looking ahead, the project aims to make automated betting accessible to everyday users. Through integration with self-custody wallets, Billy will soon be able to execute betting strategies on users’ behalf. In this setup, users maintain control of their funds while Billy manages the betting—creating a new model of permissionless, autonomous wagering.
Billy’s native Solana-based token, BILLY, currently sits at a $7.4 million market cap, and token holders may eventually gain access to automated bots and other advanced features. A “one-click bet” function is also on the horizon to further streamline the process for casual bettors.
Tackling Industry Corruption
At its core, Billy is a response to widespread issues within the traditional tipster model. As O’Rourke points out, many tipsters manipulate records or make unverifiable claims to boost sales. Billy eliminates that possibility entirely by ensuring all outcomes are on-chain and immutable.
“If we win, you can verify it. If we lose, it’s there too,” he said. “That level of honesty just doesn’t exist anywhere else in the pick-selling world. It’s all smoke and mirrors.”
And while transparency is Billy’s standout feature, the goal is to create a truly user-aligned betting assistant—one that is tireless, unbiased, and accountable. O’Rourke believes this is the future of sports betting, one that moves away from shady forums and anonymous Twitter touts toward provable performance and open networks.
Betting, Reimagined
Billy Bets is part of a growing wave of AI agents designed to perform real-world tasks. But in this case, the agent isn’t automating customer service or generating art—it’s trying to beat the odds in one of the most unpredictable industries out there. And it’s doing it while inviting the world to watch, learn, and even profit alongside it.
In a field built on secrecy and illusion, Billy’s commitment to radical transparency might just be the disruption sports betting has been waiting for.