CFTC keeps finding new ways to define crypto, sports betting

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TL;DR: The CFTC is proposing crypto rules that would pull most retail spot trading under its oversight and arguing that sports event contracts are swaps, while courts and the NFL push back. Deep cuts to staff and enforcement at the agency could also prompt a federal probe.

Key Takeaways:

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is taking steps to burnish its role as the primary regulator of digital assets, but its efforts to erect a regulatory moat around prediction markets aren’t faring nearly as well.

Last week, the CFTC issued a request for public comment on its proposed rules governing retail commodity transactions involving ‘crypto assets.’ You have until December 2 to comment on the 108-page document, which aims to help fill the gap left by last month’s failure of the Senate’s digital asset market structure bill (the CLARITY Act).

The CFTC is proposing two major changes, one involving the establishment of a new category of platforms under the CFTC’s purview, which the regulator is calling ‘crypto asset markets’ (CAMs). The goal is to establish a national “uniform set of regulations” under which CAMs can operate without worrying about different and/or contradictory state-level licensing regimes.