NFL urges Supreme Court to decide who should regulate prediction markets

The National Football League (NFL) has requested the U.S. Supreme Court to determine whether the federal government or individual states should have regulatory authority over prediction markets. In an amicus brief, the NFL backed prior court decisions that favored state regulation of prediction markets, arguing those rulings correctly classified sports-related event contracts as gambling, not swaps.

The NFL requested the court to decide the issue before the end of the pro football season in January, warning that any delay would increase consumer harm and jeopardize game integrity.

The league's legal filing coincided with a bipartisan group of states urging the Supreme Court to settle the regulatory dispute over prediction markets. The NFL emphasized the importance of preserving market integrity and noted that the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is currently policing sports-related markets on nearly every U.S. commodities exchange. However, the CFTC's rulemaking efforts are seen by the NFL as addressing many of the league's concerns.

In contrast, prediction market platforms like Polymarket claim they have implemented advanced surveillance tools and are collaborating with the CFTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission to develop a more robust regulatory framework than state laws. Despite the NFL's request for safeguards against gambling and insider trading, neither the agency nor industry players have banned bets susceptible to manipulation or raised the minimum betting age to 21, which is currently 18.

The NFL's request for Supreme Court intervention came the day after a coalition of states made a similar plea to the court. The NFL is concerned about the CFTC's ability to regulate sports betting effectively due to potential resource and staffing limitations. Brooke Nethercott, the CFTC's director of public affairs, stated that the agency has engaged with the NFL regarding rulemaking priorities, but the NFL declined to sign a memorandum of understanding, which would have facilitated better cooperation on promoting market integrity.