Kalshi CEO warns state oversight could push prediction markets offshore

Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour says that if individual states take over the policing of US prediction markets, the markets themselves will leave. His argument is simple. Squeeze the regulated players, and the demand does not disappear. It moves to offshore platforms that answer to no one. The warning arrives as Kalshi fights legal battles on multiple fronts. Several states are trying to classify its sports-event contracts as illegal gambling, and the courts cannot agree on who is right. A federal license meets 50 state rulebooks Kalshi operates as a designated contract market under the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Think of that as a federal exchange license, the same category of oversight that covers traditional futures venues. The company’s position is that this federal oversight preempts state gambling laws. Put plainly, Kalshi argues the CFTC is the referee, so states do not get to call fouls on its sports contracts. States see it differently. To them, a contract that pays out based on who wins a football game looks a lot like a sports bet, whatever the paperwork says. The federal appeals courts have now split on the question. In 2026, the Third Circuit backed Kalshi’s preemp...