Prediction market PredictIt, which started out as an academic platform focused on political forecasts, is preparing to launch a new exchange after getting the nod from the Commodities Futures Trading Commission.
PredictIt, operated by the D.C.-based Aristole, said last week that the CFTC approved its applications to operate as both a designated contract market, or DCM, and derivatives clearing organization, or DCO.
“With these approvals, Aristotle will launch a new exchange designed to provide U.S. traders with more diverse markets, deeper liquidity, and broader participation,” the company said last week in a press release.
The company plans to expand beyond just political markets, but it hasn’t yet provided details on the types of specific markets it plans to roll out. “The market offerings will branch out as is the case with other DCMs,” an Aristotle spokesperson told Decrypt, referring to other regulated prediction markets like Kalshi. We’re not announcing other specific details right now,” the spokesperson said.
The company said the platform has grown to include more than 400,000 active users, but PredictIt faced a long journey getting these key approvals from U.S. regulators.
The platform initially launched in 2014 as an academic, real-money prediction market operated by Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. It has support and is run by Artistotle, Inc., a D.C.-based political technology and data firm founded in 1983 by John Artistotle Phillips.
Phillips is CEO of Aristotle, Inc.. It hasn’t always been clear whether he holds the same title, but the spokesperson confirmed he does.
The 2014 launch proceeded after the company obtained a no action letter from the CFTC, which granted it permission to “operate a not-for-profit market for event contracts, and to offer event contracts to U.S. persons, without registration as a designated contract market, foreign board of trade, or swap execution facility, and without registration of its operators.”
In very simple terms, the regulator said PredictIt could allow U.S. users on its platform without having to pursue a DCM license, but under very limited conditions and strictly as not for profit.
In August 2022, the CFTC then revoked its no action letter, claiming the company violated the narrow terms of the arrangement. By summer of 2023, an appeals court issued an injunction that would allow PredictIt to continue operating while it battled the CFTC in court over the revoked letter.
Then, in July of this year, PredictIt and the CFTC reached a settlement that would allow PredictIt to operate under the Prediction Market Research Consortium, Inc., which is a U.S.-based not-for-profit that’s seeking 501(c)(3) status from the IRS.
It’ll be joining a growing field of competitors. Kalshi relaunched election markets in the U.S. last year after winning a court battle against the CFTC. It has since gone on to expand into sports markets, raise $185 million at a $2 billion valuation, hire a new head of crypto, and account for more than half of prediction market trading volume. Meanwhile, Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan has said the company got the nod to operate its prediction market in the U.S. after QCX, a license exchange it acquired earlier this year, got its own no action letter from the CFTC.
Prediction markets allow users to speculate and bet on the outcome of future events. The markets allow users to sell their shares at any time, meaning that an investor could buy a share and resell it when they stand to make a profit—all without having to wait to see how the market resolves.
But doing so often involves fees. For example, on PredictIt, users who sell their shares for a profit pay a 10% fee to the company and a 5% fee to process withdrawals.
Right now, one of the most active markets on PredictIt is for the 2025 election for Mayor of New York, which has seen 951,998 trades and as of today heavily favors Zohran Mamdani to win at 81% odds. In a related market, users have given Andrew Cuomo a 73% chance of coming in second place. But the participation in that market has only reached 140,655 trades. On Myriad, a prediction market developed by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan, users currently give Mamdani an 82% chance of becoming New York City’s next mayor.
