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Nevada’s gaming regulator scored a temporary win in its lawsuit against Polymarket, with a court ruling the prediction-market platform is prohibited from offering event contracts in the state for at least two weeks.
The Nevada Gaming Control Board—which regulates sports betting in the state—sued Blockratize Inc., the corporate entity behind Polymarket, on Jan. 15. The complaint, filed in Nevada state court, claims “Polymarket’s event contracts are wagers.”
The regulator also sought a temporary restraining order prohibiting Polymarket from offering event contracts in the state, which was granted by judge Jason D. Woodbury on Thursday. According to the court order, the state’s gaming regulator is “reasonably likely to prevail on the merits of the underlying case.”
Under the ruling, Polymarket is barred from offering event contracts in Nevada for an initial period of 14 days.
This time period includes the Super Bowl, but offerings on Polymarket’s U.S. app remain extremely limited. While it has featured only sports since launching in the U.S. in December, there are no NFL-related event contracts available. The company’s international site, which is only available to U.S. users who use a VPN, has expansive Super Bowl offerings.
While Polymarket has indicated to the court that it anticipates filing a “comprehensive opposition” by Feb. 2, the court determined the temporary prohibition was necessary.
“The record at this early stage in proceedings indicates polymarket offers ‘event-based contracts’ that relate to sporting and other events, including college basketball games, college and professional football games and elections,” the ruling says. Under Nevada law, that conduct constitutes the acceptance of “wagers,” and Polymarket is not licensed to offer sports betting in the state, the order says.
The potential harm to the state’s “comprehensive regulatory structure” is too significant for the court to ignore, because it “exacerbates with each day that Polymarket operates in Nevada outside the authority of the board.”
“A day means more consumers,” the order says. “More consumers means more transactions. More transactions means more potential harm to the board. As such, every day matters in this case in a literal sense.”
Gaming attorney Dan Wallach posted that Polymarket “appears” to have already cooperated with the court order and removed its offerings in the state. Polymarket didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
The case is the first lawsuit brought against Polymarket since it formally reentered the U.S. in early December. Prior to last year, it had been barred from operating in the U.S. under a settlement agreement with the Biden administration.
The regulator’s early win comes a few months after it found some success in a separate lawsuit that Polymarket’s primary competitor, Kalshi, filed against it in federal court. There, in November, a judge reversed an earlier preliminary decision and ruled that the regulator can enforce its cease-and-desist order against Kalshi over the platform’s sports event contracts.
Kalshi had sued the Nevada regulator last March after receiving a cease-and-desist. Kalshi has appealed that ruling to the Ninth Circuit. The ruling allowing Nevada to force Kalshi to stop offering sports event contracts in the state has been paused while that appeal plays out.
Polymarket and Kalshi both argue that their event contracts fall under the exclusive jurisdiction of the federal Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Sports betting companies like FanDuel and DraftKings are regulated on a state-by-state basis and have to apply for licenses in the states they operate.
Kalshi is involved in a bevy of other legal disputes across the country, including in Maryland, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. During a recent hearing in the Massachusetts case, the judge appeared inclined to enter an injunction against Kalshi, but the exact parameters of what that ruling might say remain unclear.
