It looks like what is prohibited right now is “Gambling (Real-money gambling services, casino credits, sportsbook wagers, crypto-casino tokens)”. Wanted to confirm that prediction markets are allowed?
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The classification of prediction markets is a subject of intense debate among regulators and industry participants; legally, they are classified as financial instruments but function very similarly to gambling in practice.
- Financial Instrument Perspective: Proponents argue that participants trade event contracts with each other (peer-to-peer) on a federally regulated exchange, not against “the house,” and the activity serves a legitimate economic function like price discovery and hedging risk. They are overseen by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) as a form of derivative, similar to futures contracts, allowing them to operate in all 50 U.S. states.
- Gambling Perspective: Critics, including state gaming commissions and traditional sportsbooks, argue that for the average user, the experience of staking money on an uncertain, binary outcome (e.g., whether a specific player will score a touchdown) is functionally indistinguishable from placing a sports bet. Several states have filed lawsuits and issued cease-and-desist letters to prediction market companies, contending they circumvent state gambling laws and lack consumer protections or problem gambling safeguards required of traditional sportsbooks
was hoping to get clarity from @OpenAI_Support here!
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