Kalshi's CEO tells Washington the states will drive prediction markets offshore, as a two-to-one court split heads for the Supreme Court

The head of Kalshi used a Washington stage on Wednesday to argue that the fight over who polices prediction markets is really a fight over whether they stay in the country. Speaking at DC Fintech Week in Arlington, Virginia, chief executive Tarek Mansour said the choice was not between state and federal oversight but between markets that exist in the US and markets that move offshore, CoinDesk reported.

Kalshi's exchange is overseen by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Several states have sued it and rivals, arguing that sports-event contracts are illegal betting that belongs under state gambling regulators. Federal appeals courts have split, with one major ruling for Kalshi and two for the states, and New Jersey, which lost the Kalshi-friendly case, has asked the Supreme Court to hear it, according to CoinDesk. Last week the CFTC issued one rule and proposed another that would treat event contracts as swaps under its authority.

Mansour also defended how open the markets are to scrutiny, telling the audience, "You're committing crime in broad daylight," meaning insider trades are easier to spot, The Block reported. He dismissed accusations that trading in Kalshi's bitcoin and ether perpetual futures was inflated, saying recurring trade sizes came from market makers' fixed-size orders. Whether the Supreme Court takes the New Jersey case is the next thing to watch.