Inside Prediction Markets: Europe closes ranks while Wall Street builds new products


Prediction markets crossed another milestone in June, with monthly trading volume exceeding $50 billion for the first time.

In the same week, European regulators began a new coordinated response to the sector, DraftKings completed the launch of its own exchange, and Cboe proposed bringing prediction-style contracts to the US stock market.

Europe begins to close its ranks in prediction markets

European regulators are taking a closer look at prediction markets.

Gambling regulators from nine countries, including Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and Belgium, issued a joint warning ahead of the World Cup, promising close cooperation and enforcement against platforms operating without a local licence.

They also urged sports federations and clubs to check the legal status of prediction market operators before signing commercial partnerships.

Meanwhile, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) announced Corporate reminders Many event contracts may already fall under long-standing EU restrictions on binary options.

The regulator said that simply calling a product an “event contract” does not change how it is classified under MiFID II. Together, these statements indicate that Europe is moving towards a more coordinated regulatory approach.

Gambling regulators are focusing on licensing and consumer protection, while securities regulators are examining whether some prediction market products actually fit within current financial rules.

DraftKings bets on its own exchange

DraftKings has completed the launch of DKeXits own internal prediction market exchange built around the Railbird platform it acquired last year. The company spent eight months developing the venue before moving its event contracts to third-party infrastructure.

By operating its own exchange, DraftKings can continue trading, matching and clearing within the same ecosystem rather than relying on external providers.

The move follows similar decisions by Robinhood and Coinbase, both of which have also brought major parts of their exchange infrastructure in-house as their prediction market businesses expand.

Owning the exchange infrastructure turns into a competitive advantage in prediction markets, allowing companies to capture more of the economics behind each trade rather than sharing it with third parties.

Cboe wants to turn company metrics into tradable events

Cboe is seeking approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission To include binary options linked to corporate performance metrics, expanding forecast-style trading beyond macroeconomic data and market indicators.

The proposal covers more than 100 metrics across 23 companies, including Nvidia’s data center revenues, Apple iPhone shipments, and SpaceX revenues.

Instead of trading how a stock will react to earnings, investors will trade whether a particular business metric reaches a predetermined threshold.

Unlike prediction markets you run everything Under CFTC rules, Cboe contracts will be listed as options on securities, cleared by an options clearing corporation, and distributed through the existing brokerage ecosystem.

The proposal suggests that prediction-driven products move beyond event contracts and into traditional capital markets, where a company’s fundamentals themselves can become tradeable binary outcomes.

Week number

Markets have exceeded prediction $50 billion in monthly trading volumeFor the first time in June, according to Artemis data.

Trading volume was up 75% compared to May, thanks to activity driven by the World Cup. Kalshi remained the largest place with a monthly trading volume of about $33 billion, followed by Polymarket with $14 billion and Rothera with about $2 billion.

Meanwhile, about 70% of all closed Polymarkets generated less than $10,000 in trading volume, according to a CNBC analysis of the platform’s Gamma API.

The result illustrates an important feature of prediction markets: record platform-level volume is concentrated in a relatively small number of notable events, while most individual markets remain thinly traded.

Bottom line

June’s record trading volume was largely driven by the World Cup. The next test is whether Prediction markets He can maintain this level of activity once the tournament is over. The other question is what frame absorbs the product.

Cboe asks SEC to approve forecast-style contracts as options on securities, SEC says several event contracts already fall under MiFID II, gambling regulators assert licensing authority ahead of World Cup. The SEC’s response to the Cboe filing will be the first concrete signal.

This article was written by Tanya Chipkova at www.financemagnates.com.



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