Ohio sends ten more cease-and-desist notices to prediction markets

The Ohio Casino Control Commission issued cease-and-desist letters to ten prediction market operators last week, accusing them of offering, facilitating or taking part in sports event contracts without a state licence, according to SBC Americas.

Each recipient has been told to stop providing the contracts to Ohio customers and to confirm in writing by 16 October that it has done so. The commission says the products meet Ohio's legal definition of sports gaming and therefore fall under its licensing regime.

The ten companies named are Coinbase, Gemini, Titan, Moomoo Financial, Novig Betting, Plus500US Financial Services, Polymarket, Prophet X, Robinhood, Underdog and Webull Financial.

Kalshi is not among them, despite being the company at the centre of Ohio's original dispute. It remains tied up in separate litigation and enforcement proceedings with the commission, which first issued it a cease-and-desist notice in March 2025.

The commission says this round of letters follows directly from a Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals decision last month that found in Ohio's and Tennessee's favour. A three-judge panel ruled unanimously that Kalshi's sports event contracts do not qualify as swaps under the Commodity Exchange Act, and added that even if they did, federal commodities law would not override Ohio's or Tennessee's sports betting statutes.

That finding upheld an earlier decision by the Southern District of Ohio to deny Kalshi's request for a preliminary injunction, and separately struck down an injunction that had been shielding Tennessee officials from enforcing their own sports wagering law.

OCCC Interim Executive Director Andromeda Morrison said the commission was obliged to act because these wagers lack protections Ohio law requires, particularly for young and vulnerable people, and said the appeals court ruling made plain that sports event contracts are covered by the state's gambling laws.

Ohio regulators maintain that the contracts amount to sports betting in substance: customers stake money on an athletic outcome and collect a payout if it occurs, which the state says should trigger the same licensing, taxation, age-verification and integrity obligations as any licensed sportsbook.

Governor Mike DeWine has backed the commission's stance, telling the Statehouse News Bureau that prediction markets are gambling by another name and are attempting to dodge rules that other operators must follow. DeWine, who has said he regrets signing Ohio's sports betting law in the first place, argued the firms should face the state's 20% tax and its betting age limit like everyone else.

The commission's separate case against Kalshi has not been resolved by the appellate ruling. Kalshi sued Ohio officials after receiving its original notice, arguing the Commodity Exchange Act gives the Commodity Futures Trading Commission sole authority over contracts traded on a federally registered exchange, and that its products are event contracts rather than state-regulated sports wagers. The OCCC also proposed a $5m fine against Kalshi in April, which the company is contesting in state court.

Ohio's move comes amid a broader run of setbacks for Kalshi's federal preemption argument. The Ninth Circuit ruled in August that the company's sports contracts are likely not swaps, allowing Nevada to enforce its own gaming laws, and later found in a separate case brought by California tribes that the contracts likely amount to class III gaming when offered without a compact.