Flutter Entertainment and Entain shares surged on Monday after US senators introduced bipartisan legislation that would prohibit CFTC-regulated prediction market platforms from offering sports betting and casino-style contracts, directly targeting Kalshi and Polymarket’s competitive threat to licensed sportsbook operators.
The Market Move
Flutter, owner of FanDuel, jumped 7.6% on the news. Entain, parent of Ladbrokes and BetMGM, climbed 6.4%. The moves reflect how heavily both stocks had been weighed down by prediction market competition. Platforms like Kalshi have operated under Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) oversight, bypassing the state gambling licensing frameworks that govern traditional sportsbooks — a structural asymmetry that has pressured regulated operators on both sides of the Atlantic for months.
Flutter’s FanDuel commands approximately 43% of the US sports betting market. Entain’s joint venture BetMGM recorded $2.8bn in revenue in 2025.
The Bill
Senators Adam Schiff (D-California) and John Curtis (R-Utah) introduced the bipartisan legislation on Monday. The bill would bar any entity regulated by the CFTC from listing event contracts tied to sporting events or casino-style games. Its targets are Kalshi and Polymarket’s US platform, the two dominant players in a sector that has grown to a combined valuation of nearly $20bn.
Schiff framed the bill in terms of regulatory arbitrage. The CFTC, he argued, is greenlighting these markets and supporting their growth while they bypass state consumer protection frameworks — a structural problem that requires congressional intervention, not regulatory discretion.
“The CFTC is greenlighting these markets and even promoting their growth. Congress should eliminate this backdoor which violates state consumer protections, intrudes upon tribal sovereignty and offers no public revenue.” — Senator Adam Schiff
Curtis, a Republican from Utah — one of the few US states where gambling remains constitutionally prohibited — took a different but aligned position. His concern centres on youth exposure.
“Too many young people in Utah are getting exposed to addictive sports betting and casino-style gaming contracts that belong under state control, not under federal regulators.” — Senator John Curtis
Curtis’s co-sponsorship is notable. Republican support for a bill that challenges a CFTC under Trump-appointed chairman Michael Selig signals that opposition to prediction market sports betting extends beyond the Democratic caucus. In January 2026, Selig withdrew a Biden-era proposal that would have banned sports contracts on CFTC-regulated platforms, and signalled the agency would pursue new rules permitting the markets to operate while litigation continued.
A Pattern of Legislative Pressure
The Schiff-Curtis bill is the latest in a sequence of congressional moves targeting prediction markets. In March 2026, Schiff introduced the DEATH BETS Act, which would ban contracts tied to terrorism, assassination, war, and individual deaths. Senators Chris Murphy and Greg Casar followed with the BETS OFF Act on March 17. Senators Richard Blumenthal and Andy Kim had earlier introduced the Prediction Markets Security and Integrity Act, which would similarly exclude sports event contracts from CFTC-regulated exchanges.
Republicans control the Senate majority, which limits the near-term path for Democratic-led bills. However, Curtis’s bipartisan support for Monday’s legislation introduces a more complex political calculation and increases the pressure on CFTC chairman Selig to address the sports betting jurisdictional question through rulemaking.
State-Level Enforcement
The bill arrives as state-level legal action against prediction markets accelerates. Arizona filed a 20-count criminal case against Kalshi. Eleven states have issued cease-and-desist orders. Kalshi has responded with its own lawsuits seeking to establish that its offerings are CFTC-regulated derivatives, not state-regulated gambling, and that federal jurisdiction pre-empts state action.
Kalshi has reported sports betting accounting for roughly 90% of its trading volumes — a figure that underscores how central the category is to its business model, and why the Schiff-Curtis bill, if passed, would fundamentally alter the platform’s US operations.
For traditional operators, the outcome of this jurisdictional battle carries direct commercial significance. The regulatory and legal category of iGaming has few live questions with as much market-moving potential in 2026. Flutter and Entain’s share price reactions on Monday illustrate how closely investors are watching the legislative calendar. How quickly Congress moves — and whether the CFTC responds with its own rulemaking before legislation advances — will determine how long the current competitive imbalance between state-licensed sportsbooks and federally regulated prediction markets persists.
Source: Wall Street Journal / Investing.com
