House Oversight staff want Congress to curb officials’ prediction market bets, at least on government actions and political outcomes. The November 13 memo aims those limits at officials who trade, leaving the platforms’ business intact.
The size of that business shows in Robinhood’s results. The broker’s event contracts revenue rose more than sixfold year over year in Q3 2026.
Who Congress Wants Off the Betting Slip
The committee opened its probe in May and widened it to five platforms in September. Staff asked Congress to consider two steps:
- Restrict officials in all branches from prediction markets, through an outright ban or limits on government and political contracts.
- Have platforms and regulators share the data needed to enforce those limits.
The limits would apply even when officials trade without inside information. The Senate already barred senators and their staff from prediction markets in April.
The Department of War has also barred personnel from using prediction markets for personal financial gain.
The memo cites three CFTC cases:
- The CFTC ordered former Congressman George Santos to pay $35,000 for manipulative trading on a Kalshi contract.
- The CFTC ordered White House teleprompter operator Gabriel Perez to pay $172,000 over Kalshi mention contracts.
- The CFTC alleges Google engineer Michele Spagnuolo made $1.2 million using nonpublic search data on Polymarket.com.
Kalshi caught the Santos and Perez trades, and Polymarket flagged the Google case. The memo says platform reporting like this has let the CFTC bring enforcement actions.
Why the Prediction Market Platforms Come Out Ahead
The memo says platforms first detected and reported most known insider trading cases themselves.
Its final recommendation asks for information sharing so the markets can keep detecting insider trades.
That casts the platforms as partners in enforcing the proposed limits. Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour had already backed insider trading bans for members of Congress.
The scale of the business those platforms run is easiest to see at Robinhood, which reports its event contracts revenue each quarter.
Robinhood Shows How Big the Business Has Grown
The memo does not name Robinhood, which was not part of the probe. Its results are still the clearest public measure of the industry’s scale, since Kalshi and Polymarket are private.
According to its Q3 2026 results:
- Event contracts revenue rose more than sixfold year over year to $173 million.
- Customers traded a record 16.4 billion event contracts, more than 7x a year earlier.
- Crypto revenue fell 55% year over year to $120 million.
What Could Still Change the Picture
Other fronts could still go against the platforms:
- Elizabeth Warren, a longtime crypto critic, is expected to chair Senate Banking from January.
- The CFTC has reportedly warned Kalshi of possible charges over new contract notices.
- In September, Connecticut sent cease-and-desist orders over sports contracts to nine companies, including Robinhood and Polymarket.
Robinhood’s Q4 event contracts figures will show whether that growth holds up under the added scrutiny.
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