Brian Quintenz, President Trump’s pick to chair the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), faced pointed questions Tuesday about the future for event contracts. Two Democratic senators, Adam Schiff of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey, pressed Quintenz on how he would handle the overlap between event contracts and sports betting.
“If betting on the outcome of a sporting event looks like sports betting, looks like gaming, smells like gaming, sounds like gaming, there are winners and losers like gaming, it’s probably gaming,” Schiff said.
While event contracts are regulated under the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA), wagers on sports outcomes have traditionally fallen under state gaming regulations. Both senators addressed the issue of tribal sovereignty and tribal gaming compacts, which give tribes the exclusive right to “police gaming within their territories”.
Quintenz referred to his reading of the Commodities Exchange Act to address this issue in his hearing.
‘All events are commodities’
In 2021, the prediction market platform ErisX attempted to list event contracts on sporting events but withdrew them before the CFTC could issue a formal disapproval. At the time, Quintenz—then a commissioner for the regulatory agency—issued a dissenting opinion, arguing that, under the statutory definition, “all events are commodities.”
“I had a very, very long statement when I was a commissioner,” Quintenz responded to Booker. “That provision of the statute [public interest review section] troubles me in terms of trying to execute it with repeatability and legality, especially in a post-Loper Bright world, because there is no framework that was provided for by Congress in terms of how to execute that appropriately.”
The Commodity Exchange Act allows the CFTC to conduct public interest reviews of event contracts in certain categories, including gaming. Quintenz has expressed concern about how to carry out these reviews in the absence of a clear definition from Congress.
That concern has grown in light of the Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling in Loper Bright, which overturned the Chevron doctrine. Under the decision, courts no longer defer to agencies’ interpretations of ambiguous statutes. Instead, if the CFTC’s interpretation of what constitutes the “public interest” is challenged, it must be defended in court without the benefit of judicial deference.
For Quintenz, that raises the stakes. Without a clear legal framework, any regulatory decision could face heightened scrutiny and legal vulnerability.
Principles-based regulation
In his closing exchange with senators, Quintenz was asked about his thoughts on principles-based regulation—a framework that emphasizes “broad objectives and outcomes” over rigid, prescriptive rules. He defended the approach as one that encourages innovation while still ensuring accountability.
“I believe it allows responsible innovation and allows the marketplace to evolve, to try new things, to be held to a standard of best practices, which do continue to evolve on their own,” he said. “It prevents a one-size-fits-all regime that locks in the technology approach or a standard approach.”
How he will apply that flexibility remains to be seen. However, it’s a positive signal for supporters of novel event contracts like sports and election contracts.
