Prediction Markets Face Bill Banning Sports, Election Bets

Context

Prediction markets — digital platforms where users purchase contracts that pay out based on real-world events — are the subject of a renewed legislative push in Washington. CNBC reported on March 26, 2026 that lawmakers introduced a package of bills proposing to ban platforms from offering contracts tied to sporting outcomes, political elections, and military conflicts (CNBC, Mar 26, 2026). The coverage singled out prominent platforms including Kalshi and Polymarket, and framed the measures as a response to heightened scrutiny over market integrity and the social implications of wagering on political or violent outcomes. For institutional investors and market participants, these proposals raise immediate questions about regulatory jurisdiction, counterparty risk, and the potential redirection of flow to offshore venues.

The term "prediction market" spans a broad set of products: binary event contracts, continuous-price markets, and more complex derivative structures that reference outcomes rather than underlying cashflows. Some platforms operate within formal derivatives frameworks; others have historically sat in regulatory gray zones. The contrast has become stark since October 2023, when Kalshi received explicit approval from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to list certain event contracts, effectively placing it inside the CFTC's regulatory perimeter (CFTC press release, Oct 2023). That approval created a two-tiered landscape: CFTC-regulated event venues versus largely unregulated or offshore exchanges.

Legislative action this month would, if enacted, collapse parts of that two-tier structure by removing a subset of event types from the permissible product set. Lawmakers' stated concerns include the risk of incentivizing harmful behavior, undermining electoral integrity, and creating markets that could be used for geopolitical manipulation. The proposals also reflect political optics; banning politically sensitive markets is easier to sell publicly than crafting nuanced regulatory guardrails. Nonetheless, the practical consequences for market structure, capital allocation and compliance obligations are non-trivial and warrant a detailed data-driven review.

Data Deep Dive

There are three verifiable data points that anchor the discussion. First, the regulatory flashpoint: CNBC's reporting on March 26, 2026 documents a set of bills filed in recent weeks to prohibit event contracts tied to sports, elections and war (CNBC, Mar 26, 2026). Second, the supervisory precedent: Kalshi's CFTC approval in October 2023 (CFTC press release, Oct 2023) established that at least some event contracts can be considered permissible under the Commodity Exchange Act when subject to exchange rules and clearing. Third, historical regulatory change provides context: the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Murphy v. NCAA (June 2018) effectively shifted the legal baseline for state-level sports wagering by overturning PASPA, creating a pathway for large-scale growth in regulated sports markets (U.S. Supreme Court, June 2018).

Quantitative measures of the sector remain small relative to mainstream derivatives markets, but their growth trajectory has been rapid and visible. While comprehensive industry-wide volume data is fragmented, company disclosures and press reporting suggest that active market participation on leading platforms can spike around high-profile events (e.g., major elections or championship games). That episodic concentration implies revenue and risk profiles that are event-driven rather than continuous-market-driven, a structural difference versus equity or interest-rate markets which trade steadily and deeply across time.

Comparisons are instructive. Kalshi's CFTC-approved model is analogous to exchange-traded derivatives in that it is subject to listing standards, surveillance and the CFTC's market integrity regime. Polymarket and some offshore operators have historically emphasized open participation and lower friction but without the same statutory oversight — a contrast that regulators now explicitly target. Under the proposed bills, the subset of event types that sparked concern (sports, elections, war) would be removed from permissible products, effectively aligning statutory policy with the political preference to remove sensitive contracts irrespective of platform supervision.

Sector Implications

If the legislation progresses, incumbent platforms face differentiated outcomes based on their regulatory posture. CFTC-regulated venues like Kalshi would confront narrower product windows, but benefit from an established compliance framework that could be redeployed to new, permissible event categories (economic indicators, corporate outcomes, climate events). Platforms operating in less-regulated environments may face either forced restructuring to comply with U.S. law or migration of liquidity and customer bases offshore, which would reduce transparency and complicate enforcement.

For market participants — from hedge funds to research shops — the policy change would alter the investable universe for event-driven strategies. Quantifiable exposures tied to political-event risk would shrink in those markets that comply with U.S. law, making replication via proxy instruments (e.g., futures on macroeconomic releases or option-based structures) more likely. Relative to peers in regulated derivatives markets, prediction-market product sets are narrower under these proposals; that narrowing shifts alpha sources from event-specific market-making to arbitrage and cross-market hedging.

Venture and fintech capital flows into the space would also react. A statutory ban on specific event categories raises execution risk for startups whose business plans rely on the ability to list such contracts in the U.S. That dynamic could reduce valuations for U.S.-facing platforms and redirect capital toward markets in Europe, Asia or jurisdictions with lighter restrictions. The net effect would be both a geographic reallocation of innovation and an escalation in regulatory arbitrage.

Risk Assessment

Operationally, platforms will face immediate compliance and legal costs. Firms that previously listed political or conflict-related contracts will need to implement product withdrawals, customer-notification programs, and likely adjust risk models for reduced diversification. There is also litigation risk: platforms could challenge the legislation on First Amendment or Commerce Clause theories, though courts historically have given broad deference to financial regulation. The time horizon for litigation outcomes would be measured in years, creating an interim period of regulatory uncertainty for participants.

Market integrity concerns are layered. Banning contracts in the U.S. could push order flow to opaque venues where surveillance, counterparty credit controls, and AML/KYC standards are weaker. Paradoxically, an ill-considered ban could reduce on‑shore transparency and increase systemic risk by shrinking the pool of regulated counterparties and custodians. Conversely, a robust licensing regime that restricts certain categories but enhances surveillance and reporting on others could improve information quality and systemic oversight.

Macroprudentially, the direct systemic risk from prediction markets is small today relative to cleared interest-rate or equity derivatives, but the political salience of election- and war-related contracts amplifies reputational and policy risks. Policymakers will have to weigh narrow systemic metrics against broader social externalities when deciding whether to legislate prohibitions or to pursue calibrated regulation.

Fazen Capital Perspective

From our vantage point, the legislation under discussion oversimplifies a nuanced trade-off: social and political concerns are real, but blunt prohibitions risk driving activity to less-transparent venues where oversight is diminished. A contrarian implication is that a targeted regulatory framework — one that combines explicit prohibitions for narrowly defined harmful contracts with a rigorous licensing, surveillance and disclosure regime for permissible event types — would likely produce better outcomes for market integrity and investor protection than an across-the-board ban.

We also expect product innovation to pivot. With sports, election and war contracts potentially removed from the domestic toolkit, platforms and trading counterparties will reallocate engineering and trading resources toward measurable, verifiable event classes (e.g., macroeconomic release levels, commodity production statistics, climate measures). That reallocation could compress bid/ask spreads in event classes amenable to objective settlement criteria, benefitting sophisticated liquidity providers and institutional market-makers.

Finally, geopolitical arbitrage will intensify. Markets in jurisdictions with clearer rules of the road will attract capital and talent, while regulators that engage with industry — for example, by expanding permitted event categories under strict oversight — will foster onshore liquidity. Institutional investors should therefore treat this as a policy-driven reconfiguration of market plumbing, not merely a short-term compliance exercise. For further institutional analysis of regulatory shifts, see our insights and a focused note on derivatives policy frameworks in our insights.

FAQs

Q: How have regulators treated similar products historically? A: Historically, U.S. treatment has been bifurcated. The CFTC has asserted jurisdiction over event contracts when they meet the legal criteria for futures or swaps, as demonstrated by Kalshi's approval in October 2023 (CFTC, Oct 2023). State-level approaches to betting (notably after the U.S. Supreme Court's June 2018 decision in Murphy v. NCAA) created permissive regimes for sports wagering, but prediction markets have not been uniformly assimilated into those regimes.

Q: If U.S. bans certain contracts, will activity move offshore? A: Likely yes. A statutory prohibition on specified event types will create incentives for operators and users to seek venues outside U.S. jurisdiction, increasing cross-border transactional complexity and reducing transparency. That migration pattern has precedent in other fintech sectors where regulatory divergence creates migration corridors.

Q: What are practical implications for institutional counterparties? A: Practically, counterparties should anticipate reduced product availability on U.S.-compliant venues, re-evaluate counterparty credit and legal risk for off-shore counterparties, and consider operational changes to surveillance and settlement processes for event-linked positions. Hedging strategies that previously relied on onshore event contracts may need redesign.

Bottom Line

Legislation introduced on March 26, 2026 aims to ban sports-, election-, and war-related prediction contracts and would materially reshape a nascent market that already straddles regulated and unregulated models; the most likely near-term outcome is product narrowing onshore coupled with migration offshore. Institutional market participants should treat this as a structural regulatory event with second-order impacts on liquidity, product design and cross-border risk allocation.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.