Bipartisan senators ask CFTC to probe Polymarket

Senators John Curtis, a Republican from Utah, and Adam Schiff, a Democrat from California, asked the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to open an inquiry into Polymarket after a report found the platform paid social media creators to stage fake winning bets and promote the service.

The report reviewed 1,105 videos from 10 creators posted between December 2025 and mid-May and found a bet appeared in about 70% of the clips. The wagers shown, totaling roughly $1.9 million, were not real in the examples examined, and some creators staged wins on replica versions of the site.

In a letter to CFTC Chair Michael Selig, the senators questioned whether the agency is enforcing existing law and whether it is equipped to regulate prediction markets. They asked whether the CFTC is investigating Polymarket and urged the agency to commit to preserving state and tribal authority over sports betting and casino-style gaming products.

The senators wrote they are ‘concerned that the Commission is neither enforcing the law appropriately, nor is equipped to serve as a federal gambling regulator.' They added the Commission ‘should not allow companies to invoke CFTC oversight as a way to avoid state and tribal gambling laws, weaken consumer protections, or promote betting-style products through deceptive campaigns.'

A CFTC spokesperson declined to confirm or deny whether the agency has opened an investigation.

Polymarket issued a statement saying it is conducting a full audit of active promotional content to ensure compliance with its standards and with legal and disclosure requirements, and that it is committed to accurate, fair and transparent markets.

Polymarket is valued at about $15 billion. The platform settled with the CFTC in 2022 over offering event-based binary options, agreeing to pay $1.4 million in fines and to block U.S. users. In 2024, law enforcement actions included seizure of the company CEO's phone and reports of a Department of Justice inquiry. Regulators and prosecutors have also pursued cases tied to insider trading on prediction markets; prosecutors charged an active-duty U.S. soldier after a single user collected more than $400,000 on a market about the removal of Venezuela's president.

The senators asked the CFTC to provide details on any enforcement actions, its staffing and resources for overseeing prediction platforms, and its position on the scope of federal oversight as the agency asserts jurisdiction over these markets and faces disputes with states over sports-related betting.