Elastic Markets

Spend Market run on a two-phase lifecycle we call "Elastic Markets." Every market opens as a parimutuel pool, and if it draws enough capital, it graduates to a full order book. On the Spend Market site these two phases appear simply as Early Pool and Open Market; this handbook prefixes them with Phase 1 and Phase 2 for clarity.

• Phase 1: Early Pool. A parimutuel pool. You buy outcome tokens against a shared pot; prices are implied by the ratio of capital across outcomes; collateral is locked until the market resolves or graduates.
• Phase 2: Open Market. When the pool clears a threshold, the market graduates to a central limit order book (CLOB) and trades like a standard exchange: limit orders, market orders, exit anytime.

The structure follows the interest. Markets that earn volume grow a real book; markets that don't resolve straight from the pool. Both are by design. The system adapts to the demand each market actually attracts. Phase 1 is for conviction. Phase 2 is for exits and precision.