CFTC Files Motion To Shut Down Kalshi’s Election Markets After Betting Platform’s ‘Huge Win’ Against Regulator

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is filing a motion to shut down Kalshi’s election betting markets after the firm scored up a legal victory against the regulator.

According to new court documents, the CFTC is asking a US court for an emergency stay of a judge’s recent decision to overturn the regulatory body’s order to stop Kalshi from offering election betting contracts.

The CFTC says that without the benefit of the court’s reasoning, it would be unable to decide whether to file an appeal or not.

Bloomberg reported earlier this week that a judge ruled in favor of Kalshi, allowing the firm to go ahead with its plan to offer users the ability to bet on the results of the upcoming 2024 presidential election.

However, the CFTC says its request for a stay should be granted as soon as possible as Kalshi plans on going live with its election betting as soon as this week.

“Time is of the essence in the issuance of a stay. The CFTC expects that Plaintiff Kalshi will immediately list the relevant election contracts and that trading will begin as soon as the contracts list. Plaintiff has already announced on its homepage that ‘Election Markets are Coming to Kalshi!…’

This means, absent a stay, if Kalshi self-certifies the contracts before 8:15 a.m. on Monday, September 9, it may list them as early as Tuesday morning.”

In a recent post on the social media platform X, crypto lawyer Jake Chervinsky called the judge’s previous ruling a “huge win” for Kalshi and said that filing lawsuits against regulators who overstep their bounds is a viable tactic to counter them.

“Huge win for Kalshi against the CFTC. I want to see the opinion before I start dancing on the grave of the administrative state, but this is even more evidence that the best way to deal with regulatory overreach is to file more lawsuits.”

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