Crypto.com petitions Supreme Court to settle sports event contract circuit split
Crypto.com has petitioned the US Supreme Court to resolve a circuit split over sports event contracts, becoming the third party to seek federal clarity on whether state gambling laws can block CFTC-regulated offerings. The filing follows a Ninth Circuit loss to Nevada that stripped its federal preemption shield. Robinhood filed a separate petition the same week. The petitions ask whether the Commodity Exchange Act governs these contracts and would preempt conflicting state rules.
Crypto.com's petition joins two prior Supreme Court filings on the same question, giving the justices three requests to resolve a split that now threatens every CFTC-registered platform offering sports-linked contracts. The Ninth Circuit's ruling against Crypto.com in Nevada removed the federal shield that had blocked state gambling enforcement, and without Supreme Court intervention the platform must geofence state by state.
Kalshi faces identical exposure from its own Ninth Circuit loss and parallel state suits in Connecticut and Baltimore. Each new state filing compounds legal spend while fragmenting liquidity across geofenced markets. A cert grant would freeze that cascade and deliver uniform federal rules; a denial leaves Crypto.com and its competitors fighting fifty separate gaming commissions with circuit precedent running against them.