“The crypto exchange is taking legal action against Connecticut, Michigan and Illinois, Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal wrote on X.”, — write: www.coindesk.com
The company filed lawsuits to “confirm what is clear,” Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal wrote in a post on X on Friday: that prediction markets fall under the jurisdiction of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and not individual state gaming regulators.
Prediction markets let users speculate on events by buying shares in contracts pegged to potential outcomes such as the winner of a boxing match or central bank interest-rate decisions. Coinbase on Wednesday announced plans to incorporate prediction markets, initially through integrating Kalshi. State gaming regulators are trying to flex their muscles to prevent such services being offered on the basis that they are a form of gambling.
“State efforts to control or outright block these markets stifle innovation and violate the law,” Grewal wrote.
“Prediction markets are fundamentally different from sportsbooks. Casinos win only if you lose and set odds to maximize their profits,” he added. “Prediction markets are neutral exchanges, indifferent to price, that match buyers and sellers.”
The markets are classified as a form of derivative because their value depends on the outcome of a future event.
Congress deliberately excluded certain specific underliers from its definition of a commodity, making it clear that everything else falls within the CFTC’s purview, according to Grewal.
“Coinbase brings this action to prevent Defendants from unlawfully applying Illinois gambling laws to federally regulated transactions that are subject to uniform federal law under the exclusive jurisdiction of the CFTC,” the exchange’s filing in Illinois dated Dec. 18 said.
- As of October 2025, GoPlus has generated $4.7M in total revenue across its product lines. The GoPlus App is the primary revenue driver, contributing $2.5M (approx. 53%), followed by the SafeToken Protocol at $1.7M.
- GoPlus Intelligence’s Token Security API averaged 717 million monthly calls year-to-date in 2025, with a peak of nearly 1 billion calls in February 2025. Total blockchain-level requests, including transaction simulations, averaged an additional 350 million per month.
- Since its January 2025 launch, the $GPS token has registered over $5B in total spot volume and $10B in derivatives volume in 2025. Monthly spot volume peaked in March 2025 at over $1.1B, while derivatives volume peaked the same month at over $4B.
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In a package of confirmations, the US Senate approved Mike Selig to lead the CFTC and Travis Hill to run the FDIC, both with major potential reach into crypto.
- The US Senate moved to confirm a massive package of President Donald Trump’s nominees on Thursday, including two officials with important regulatory roles over the crypto sector.
- The chamber approved the confirmations of Mike Selig to run the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Travis Hill to lead the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.
- Selig will have a leading role as a crypto watchdog, replacing Acting Chairman Caroline Pham, who has been pushing an aggressive crypto policy agenda in the absence of a permanent agency chief.
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