Utah | Crypto

Derek Brown likened the prediction market company to a “public nuisance“ that was “causing a significant and substantial ongoing harm“ to state residents. Update (Oct. 20, 9:53 pm UTC): This article has been updated to include a statement from Kalshi. Utah Attorney General Derek Brown announced a lawsuit against Kalshi, its affiliates and two Susquehanna trading companies, alleging that the prediction markets platform had been facilitating illegal betting in the US state since 2024. In a Tuesday press briefing, Brown said Utah officials had petitioned a court to compel the companies to return about $30 million to $60 million in profits they made through allegedly illegal event contracts. The Utah attorney general alleged that Kalshi illegally offered its services to more than 32,000 users in the state, resulting in significant losses. Read more

CFTC Chair Michael Selig has said that the agency has authority over prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket and warned it will defend that jurisdiction in court if challenged. The US state of Utah is set to block prediction market platforms such as Kalshi and Polymarket, escalating a growing dispute between state regulators and federal authorities over how the industry should be regulated. On Wednesday, Utah’s HB243 (Gambling Revisions) bill was sent to the governor’s desk after passing the Utah House on Feb. 10 and clearing the Senate on Feb. 27. The bill defines “proposition betting” as gambling. Proposition bets are wagers on individual events within a game, such as how a specific athlete performs or whether a team reaches a certain statistic, rather than the final outcome of the game itself. The goal of the legislation is to prevent companies from offering sports-related prediction or prop betting in Utah, including through platforms that label themselves as prediction markets rather than sportsboo...