Overview
- On Feb. 4, CFTC Chair Mike Selig withdrew the 2024 event-contracts proposal and a September advisory he said caused confusion for market participants.
- Selig directed staff to draft a new event‑contracts rule grounded in the Commodity Exchange Act and criticized the prior plan as a "frolic into merit regulation."
- The scrapped 2024 proposal would have classified political outcome contracts as contrary to the public interest alongside illicit-event contracts.
- The policy pivot follows the CFTC’s loss in litigation over Kalshi’s offering, after which political prediction markets were permitted to launch.
- Industry interest has grown, with companies such as Coinbase exploring entries and firms like Cboe weighing related products, while Congress negotiates a crypto market‑structure bill that could cement the CFTC’s authority over non‑security spot markets.