Polymarket Seeks Full CFTC Approval for Its Main Platform: Report

Polymarket has approached the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) about bringing its main on-chain prediction market to the United States, Bloomberg reported today, citing people familiar with the matter.

The reported move would mark a notable shift in the platform’s push to operate fully within U.S. regulatory bounds. As The Defiant has reported, Polymarket today runs two separate platforms. The main, international on-chain exchange offers predictions on a wide range of event contracts and settles trades on Polygon using its own stable token, backed by USDC; Polymarket US is a more recently launched, separate platform, which provides U.S. users with access through licensed intermediaries, rather than interacting directly with the on-chain protocol.

The U.S. arm was built on the back of Polymarket’s $112 million acquisition of CFTC-licensed derivatives exchange QCEX, and officially began its rollout in December 2025 after Polymarket had been barred from operating in the U.S. since 2022.

Getting CFTC approval for the main exchange to operate in the U.S. would let users there trade directly on-chain, putting Polymarket’s on-chain infrastructure under full federal supervision. Whether the CFTC would accept on-chain settlement, USDC collateral, and the platform’s broader market scope remains an open question.

The news arrives against a shifting regulatory backdrop. The CFTC has signaled it believes prediction markets should fall under federal oversight. On-off-chain hybrid platform Kalshi already operates as a fully CFTC-regulated event contract market, adding competitive pressure in the U.S. specifically.

This article was written with the assistance of AI workflows. All our stories are curated, edited and fact-checked by a human.