00:00Prediction markets, at some point, we knew that this was going to come.
00:04There would be more than just the states getting involved as to whether or not these companies can function and
00:09operate around the country.
00:11So now we have a Senate bill that is up here, and I don't know what's going to end up
00:15happening here.
00:16And listen, it may not come to fruition to make it voted positively, negatively.
00:20I have no idea.
00:21But if this vote goes through, whether it's in a month, two months, six months, or a year, this, unfortunately,
00:28or fortunately, depending on how you feel about prediction markets, could lead to somewhat of a downfall of them operating.
00:36Yeah, Craig, it's almost so crazy to talk about lawmakers introducing this bill right now, that prediction markets are gambling
00:43act, which, as you mentioned, would functionally just kind of destroy prediction markets as we know them.
00:47It would make sure that prediction markets aren't able to offer sports betting style contracts or casino style contracts, which
00:53is about 86% of all the money they've taken over the past year is sports betting.
00:58So without that, they would just be fundamentally a much different business.
01:01But we've been talking about prediction markets for over a year now, you and me, how it took a while
01:07for states to react, took a while for regulators to react.
01:09But finally, we're seeing a real big push in Congress.
01:13And I'll note this one is bipartisan, too.
01:14It's from Senator Adam Schiff, a Democrat in California, as well as John Curtis, a Republican in Utah, which is
01:21notable because Utah doesn't have any gambling.
01:23They certainly don't have sports betting.
01:25But right now, they do have prediction market activity going on in the state.
01:28So prediction markets are angering those states that don't want sports betting is all just the same as they've been
01:34angering states that say, oh, if you want to do sports betting, you have to go through us.
01:37The proposal would change the language of the Commodity Exchange Act to explicitly prohibit sports style contracts or even casino
01:46style contracts if they ever get issued to make sure that, you know, companies like Taoshi, Polymarket, et cetera, can't
01:53really offer sports betting.
01:55But with a different name, you know, there was a release from both senators that came out pretty hard against
02:00it.
02:00It's criticized the CFTC for essentially greenlighting these sports event contracts to exist.
02:05As we know, these prediction markets have been around for a while, but they only got into sports about a
02:10year ago, which is when the new administration kind of greenlit prediction markets to do sports.
02:15If the CFTC is working on rules right now that it says is going to really govern this, it's soliciting
02:20comments from stakeholders.
02:22We'll see when those rules get put out.
02:24But there's more there's more kind of momentum building in Congress.
02:28It's notable it's bipartisan from both aisles.
02:30There's another bill that Senator Chris Murphy put out about a month ago that wanted to explicitly make sure that
02:36we state that you cannot bet on assassinations or war or death on prediction markets,
02:42which has been a controversial topic as the U.S.'s involvement with Iran has spiked and Venezuela, where, you know,
02:50some users have said markets were settled because of death or not because of death.
02:54And these prediction markets have kind of had to play catch up.
02:56So it's interesting we're seeing on Capitol Hill this push moving against prediction markets, at least to restrict them.
03:02Certainly, if this measure would get passed and go through, it'd have to then be signed into law.
03:07You know, Trump has been very, very pro prediction markets.
03:09So it's it doesn't really seem like this would actually happen anytime soon.
03:13But it is signaling, you know, more effort from folks across the aisle, which I think is really notable, especially
03:18because you have the federal agency right now moving to defend these contracts in court with about 30 states suing
03:24to stop them.
03:25You know, you just had Arizona filed a criminal lawsuit against Calci for offering illegal sports betting or what it
03:31says is illegal sports betting.
03:32And Nevada just won a temporary court decision, which basically kicked Calci out of the state until the the court,
03:39the lawsuit proceeds.
03:40So a lot more opposition swirling around the prediction market space.
03:44But one thing that is constant is there's still uncertainty.
03:47There's still not clarity.
03:48Maybe the Supreme Court will figure this out.
03:50We'll have to wait and see.
03:51But, you know, certainly more opposition against them right now.
03:54We'll have to wait and see.
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