Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Betting on the upcoming election.
00:06All right, let's do this.
00:08Let's get it out of the way here.
00:09I mean, my gosh, as if I don't see enough ads all over my TV
00:13or my phone or social media or everywhere else.
00:15I feel like this is my respite from that this one hour that
00:19we do here on Newswire, but you gotta lock me in here.
00:23Anyway, who's taking bets here on the upcoming election?
00:27And is this a company in the United States?
00:29Because I know that this was prohibited in the past.
00:32Yeah, so Calshi is and what happens, Craig?
00:35We've had a little bit of a story here.
00:37Let me give you some background.
00:39Basically, Calshi allows for the trading of futures commodities.
00:43That's not just elections and political stuff.
00:46You can bet on how many Teslas will be delivered.
00:49You can bet on whether Bitcoin is going to hit a new high.
00:53So there's all kinds of things that you can bet on on Calshi
00:56and they basically said, look, you know, election predicting
00:59an election that is really no different.
01:02And so they went to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission
01:05and they said, you know, look, we're going to do this and
01:07they thought that they were okay to do it because a smaller
01:10operation had been given an okay to do something similar.
01:15The problem with that kind of popped up though is Calshi
01:18is trying to make it a lot bigger, right?
01:20Some people will be allowed to bet up to a hundred million
01:22with Calshi, whereas the other program predicted it was
01:27capped at, I think it's $850.
01:29So it's vastly different that way, but basically the DC
01:34Court of Appeals ruled that Calshi should not be prevented
01:39from taking these election bets while this case is being
01:44heard by the DC Court of Appeals.
01:47The CFTC tried to say that there would be irreparable harm
01:51if this election betting was allowed during this presidential
01:55race. The attorney for the CFTC basically said, you know,
02:01the harm to the public is going to be profound at a time
02:04and I don't mean to be dramatic, but Americans broadly
02:07believe that our democracy is under threat.
02:10But the three judge panel, they just didn't see it that
02:14way. They said that the CFTC didn't make a good enough
02:17case that there will be harm.
02:19Now, they said that they're not necessarily far away from
02:23showing there could be harm.
02:25They just have to get more specific.
02:27They have to show something like, you know, if a political
02:30campaign started to encourage people to buy these, that would
02:34be an issue, right?
02:35If we had foreign investors who were somehow bypassing the
02:39know-your-customer stuff with Calshi and making, you know,
02:43different bids and driving up a market this way or that
02:46way, that would be an issue.
02:48But the CFTC wasn't able to show that any of this will
02:52definitively happen if Calshi is allowed to take these
02:56bets. So, look, the case is still ongoing.
03:00There's just not the stay and the CFTC asked for an expedited
03:05schedule on this, but oral arguments under that schedule
03:08wouldn't be heard until December, Craig.
03:09So it looks like unless they can come back and really prove
03:14that something can go wrong immediately with Calshi, that
03:18this election betting will stay open through the US election
03:21and then we'll figure it out from there, right?
03:24We'll still have to have the case and we'll still have to
03:25see if we're able to do this the next time around.
03:28But it's an interesting case.
03:30It's an interesting situation when you talk about a website
03:34that's used for, you know, you can say if Chapel Rowan
03:38is going to have a number one album or not and now we're
03:40talking about betting on the election as well.
03:42So it's kind of crazy.