This week in the prediction markets news cycle, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) sued the state of Wisconsin in retaliation to state authorities’ lawsuits against various prediction markets.
Elsewhere, legislators in both Ohio and Iowa have ideas about regulating and taxing prediction markets, the Senate banned its own members and staff from trading on event contracts, and the NBA and other sports leagues had plenty to say to the CFTC.
But that’s just us scratching the surface. Every Friday in Prediction Markets Weekly, we look at some of the other news you may have missed.
Everyone you can think of has thoughts for the CFTC
The end of this week was the deadline for parties to submit notes to the CFTC during the federal regulatory body’s public comment period for its proposed rulemaking related to prediction markets. Suffice it to say there’s plenty to sort through; as of the time of writing, more than 1,500 submissions had been filed.
As well as major sports leagues and players’ unions, a wide range of stakeholders and observers had their say, including but certainly not limited to:
- Sportsbooks/sports contracts companies FanDuel, DraftKings, and Fanatics
- The Coalition for Prediction Markets and its members: Coinbase, Crypto.com, Kalshi, Robinhood and Underdog
- Tribal entities
- Responsible gambling advocates
- Gambling regulators
- State and federal legislators
- Academics
Breaking it all down would take thousands of words that we don’t have, but one of the more interesting points was prediction markets operators seeming to acknowledge that while event contracts on sports should be allowed as “swaps”, contracts on casino games should not.
In a statement in response to those Coalition for Prediction Markets comments, California Nations Indian Gaming Association (CNIGA) Chairman James Siva said that the “concession only underscores our argument that sports-based event contracts are gaming”, arguing that the same arguments used by prediction market platforms to dismiss casino gaming contracts also apply to sports event contracts.
Rep. Titus want House to mimic Senate ban
Nevada Democratic Rep. Dina Titus has been an outspoken critic of prediction markets’ expansion. On Thursday, she introduced a resolution in Congress that would essentially do for the House what the Senate just did to itself: prevent participation in prediction market trading.
Titus’ legislation would amend House rules to prohibit members of Congress, their staff, and House officers from entering into any financial agreement or contract involving an “excluded commodity” as defined under the Commodity Exchange Act. The resolution also calls on the executive and judicial branches to adopt similar restrictions.
“Like with stock trading, no Member of Congress should be able to profit off their insider knowledge by placing informed bets on prediction market platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket,” said Titus. “We saw this happen with the [Nicolas] Maduro arrest and again before President Trump’s war in Iran began. This legislation is fair and fosters trust and transparency from Congress to the American people.”
Nevada state court issues preliminary injunction against Kalshi
We’re now at the point where the prediction markets news volume has increased so exponentially (as have the number of court cases) that litigation updates get buried.
This week, a state judge in Nevada granted the Nevada Gaming Control Board’s request for a preliminary injunction against Kalshi and ordered the company to stop allowing Nevada residents to trade event contracts related to sports, entertainment, and politics. Kalshi has until May 4 to do so, unless there is intervention from higher state or federal courts. Kalshi can appeal Judge Jason Woodbury’s decision.
Is Kalshi now the 4th-biggest sportsbook?
Eilers and Krejcik Gaming (EKG) shared in its EKG Line newsletter a snippet of its latest Prediction Markets Monitor, which suggested that in March 2026, Kalshi ranked as the fourth-largest operator offering sports betting (or an equivalent by another name).
EKG calculates what it calls a “sports handle-comparable” for prediction markets by assessing a range of factors across tens of millions of market-level data points. It estimated that in March, Kalshi ranked behind only DraftKings, FanDuel, and Fanatics on an adjusted per-adult basis.
However, EKG noted multiple key caveats, including that Kalshi (like Crypto.com and Polymarket) benefits from both organic activity and partner-driven volume through its partnerships with the likes of Robinhood and PrizePicks.
California and Texas lead sports contract volume
As noted by InGame, the EKG report also determined that 69% of all sports contracts are originating in the 19 states where there is no legal online sports betting. And 43% comes from just two states: California and Texas, the two states in which every state-regulated sportsbook most wishes it was allowed to operate.
The data would seem to suggest what sportsbook executives have been saying for months: at face value, sports event contracts increase the total addressable market of sports betting (or “betting) more than they cannibalize state-regulated sports betting. The biggest opportunity being realized by predictions in legal sports betting states may be the 18-20 age demographic, which is generally allowed to trade on prediction markets but most commonly prohibited from betting on sportsbooks.
Polymarket to power SEGG Media’s Sports.com Predict market
We end with the latest in Polymarket’s seemingly endless list of partnerships, as the company will power the prediction market offering of SEGG Media, formerly Lottery.com.
SEGG operates brands including Sports.com, Concerts.com, and TicketStub.com in addition to Lottery.com. Sports.com will soon offer something called Sports.com Predict, the latest (as of the time of writing, at least) entrant in the prediction markets field. Sports.com Predict will leverage Polymarket’s established prediction market technology stack, enabling users to participate in real-time sports outcome markets directly within Sports.com.
