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CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

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101–110 of 226 posts

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#101
post #18

Just listen to the overwhelming silence from the “states’ rights” crowd.

Most people invoke the "states' rights" platitude when the federal government oversteps on constitutional matters that haven't been specifically legislated. In this case, Congress already passed a law regulating these activities, and it seems pretty clear-cut that Kalshi engages in interstate commerce, so New York will likely lose if this gets to the Supreme Court. That's not to say I think event prediction markets a…

> In this case, Congress already passed a law regulating these activities, and it seems pretty clear-cut that Kalshi engages in interstate commerce, so New York will likely lose if this gets to the Supreme Court.

That is a wild take. Interstate regulatory power does not prevent a state from passing laws regulating things happening inside its own state.

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#103
post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. If you take Kalshi out of it, that’s exactly how the law is supposed to work. The State of New York does not have the power to compel NYSE to stop operating in New York either, irrespective of what laws NY passed, as that is with the SEC. They also can’t enforce a law saying companies in New York must file 10Qs every month or something. Again, federal. See: supremacy clause, interstate commerce. (The latter has…

It's kind of hard to take Kalshi out of this, since the whole premise for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's authority here is that Kalshi is a commodity futures trading exchange, not a gambling site.

Maybe an "event outcome prediction contract" simply ought not to be considered a "commodity" under any consistent interpretation of the law and the English fucking language.

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course not. If a building exists, there is a risk it burns down. Insurance just moves that risk around. The only way to eliminate the risk is to not build anything anywhere.

So what would be the difference between buying insurance against downtime of a service you depend on (eg. Cloudflare) vs making a bet on the prediction market that there will be downtime? Even without these markets there is risk that the service goes down. The existence of the prediction market doesn't cause it to be possible.

The difference seems to be that it’s insurance if you’re buying protection against your own home burning down.

Versus when you’re financially wagering that your neighbor’s house burns down. (I.e whether you get paid back if the misfortune impacts you, vs you getting paid if misfortune visits someone else.)

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#105
post #15

EDIT: see DannyBee's comment below ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49266746 ). It does look like the CFTC has extrapolated the "nationwide" out of either some novel interpretation of the filing or just entirely fabricated it as their justification for their action. I've got no love for Kalshi, but "orders Kalshi to continue operate in New York" doesn't seem to be present anywhere in the actual release. The art…

2 is false, actually. If you read the complaint, the prayer for relief is quite clear that they only are trying to stop them from operating in new york, deliberately offering gambling to new yorkers, etc. There is no relief requested nationwide.

Isn't the act of not offering something in NY = to not offering it nationwide?

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#106
post #28

It was never more virtuous to be options-trading GME shares on Robinhood than gambling at the dog track or betting on basketball games. The only reason some regulators are going after Kalshi or Polymarket is that the casino owners are lining these particular politicians' pockets more than the futures trading companies are. I actually am not opinionated on it other than all kinds of gambling are basically the same --…

I agree with you that gambling on options via Robinhood is not great, but it at least theoretically has value to society and has a long history of being used by slightly more responsible entities which makes it harder to just, say, ban it out right.

Betting on the superbowl winner is none of that.

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#108
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edited my earlier comment to point here. Is your assessment that CFTC is pulling the broader impact fully out of the air, or are likely to try to spin the coverage of events in New York for participants outside of New York as counting as interstate commerce?

Oh worse than that. The "emergency powers" they speak of are 7 U.S.C. § 12a(9), and they are quite specific. It gives them the authority to direct a registered entity to do a few specific things. None of those things are relevant to here. It's stuff like emergency margin requirements, position limits, etc. Not "violate state law". It gives them no power to enable a registered entity to violate a TRO, or anything like…

Very high value comments throughout the thread, thank you.

What consequences, if any, could the CFTC face for this?

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#109
post #20

> said Chairman Michael S. Selig. “Congress did not intend for derivatives exchanges to be regulated under a patchwork of state gaming laws. Ah yes, "derivatives" which are "not intended to fall under gaming laws" such as... *checks Kalshi website* 58 million dollars riding on which team is the 2027 NFL champion. Oh yeah, totally a financial derivative there, not related to gambling at all. *sigh*

Totally a financial derivative for Mattress Mack, but probably not for the rest of us.

Re: CFTC declares market emergency, orders Kalshi to continue to operate in New York

#110
post #28

It was never more virtuous to be options-trading GME shares on Robinhood than gambling at the dog track or betting on basketball games. The only reason some regulators are going after Kalshi or Polymarket is that the casino owners are lining these particular politicians' pockets more than the futures trading companies are. I actually am not opinionated on it other than all kinds of gambling are basically the same --…

Wrong. Totally. Options on GME and win/loss bets on basketball and dog racing are not the same as the level of prop bets and betting on things occuring.

Totally completely wrong.

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