Regulations
By Maheen Hernandez
1 / 14
The Numbers Behind the Push. Bernstein Research put a figure on it: the prediction market industry could hit $240 billion in…
2 / 14
US Legal Fights Complicate the Picture. Even if the FCA moves forward, it won't be a clean road for platforms hoping to enter the UK market.
3 / 14
What Comes Next for UK Retail Access. The FCA's outreach to prediction market companies is real, but no timeline for a formal decision…
4 / 14
The UK's Financial Conduct Authority is weighing whether to scrap a six-year-old ban that's kept British retail investors locked out of prediction markets — and platforms like…
5 / 14
The ban dates to 2019, when the FCA barred the selling, marketing, and distribution of binary options to retail consumers.
6 / 14
Despite the ban, plenty of British retail traders have been routing around it using VPNs to reach Kalshi and Polymarket, both of which run legally in the United States.
7 / 14
The FCA's interest makes more sense in that context. It's not just about ideology or consumer protection framing.
8 / 14
And that's kind of the core tension here. The 2019 ban made sense in its moment — binary options had a genuinely bad reputation, tied to fraud and aggressive marketing tactics.
9 / 14
See also: FCA Eliminates 7-Day IPO Research Wait, Boosting UK Market Competitiveness
10 / 14
Kalshi is fighting on multiple fronts. So is the broader industry.
11 / 14
If the FCA lifts the ban and UK-based platforms or US operators try to set up shop in Britain, they'll probably face similar pressure from whatever UK bodies oversee gaming and…
12 / 14
More context: FCA Launches Handbook API to Transform Compliance for 50,000 UK Financial Firms
13 / 14
For UK retail investors who've been using VPNs to access Kalshi and Polymarket, any formal regulatory opening would be a big deal.
14 / 14
Bernstein's $240 billion volume forecast sits in the background of all of this.
The Currency Analytics
Want the full story?