Major sports organizations — the NBA, PGA Tour and NCAA — are pushing the federal government to require prediction markets to raise their minimum age for sports betting from 18 to 21 years old.
The associations have urged federal regulators in recent weeks to tighten the industry's age restrictions given the potential risks to younger bettors, according to letters they submitted to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which is preparing to write the first federal rules for the prediction market industry.
Online sportsbooks, like FanDuel or DraftKings, are regulated by states, most of which require users to be 21 years old to gamble. But prediction markets, including Kalshi and Polymarket, are not regulated as gambling companies and have set their own minimum participation age at 18.
“This disparity presents a significant risk of inducing college students — and potentially even high school students — to engage in these markets in a manner detrimental to their well-being and harmful to this country’s collegiate sports endeavors as a whole,” the NCAA wrote in its letter, which also described the “potentially addictive and harmful nature of wagering on sports.”
The NCAA asked federal regulators to specifically restrict betting on college sport prediction markets to those 21 and up; the NBA and PGA requested the change for all sporting events.
The NBA pointed out that trading on prediction markets “carries material risks (e.g., of financial loss) that may be particularly acute for younger individuals,” according to the league’s letter to federal officials. If regulators decline to set the age minimum at 21, they should restrict advertising prediction markets to those who are 18 to 20 years old, the NBA added.
Online sports betting and gambling has exploded in popularity since a 2018 Supreme Court ruling opened the floodgates, becoming commonplace not only on college campuses but also among high schools and middle school students. Prediction markets began taking off in the U.S. in 2024 and have rapidly attracted young users.
Prediction markets, however, deny that they are gambling companies, like sportsbooks. Online sportsbooks typically set the odds and take the other side of wagers, meaning they pocket money from losing bets. Prediction markets, by contrast, provide a platform for users to buy and sell contracts with one another, taking a commission from the trades. Critics contend that this is not a strong enough distinction and the markets should be regulated by states as gambling — a legal dispute that could end up at the Supreme Court.
While public criticism and controversy around prediction markets have swelled in recent months, other major sports associations have been keen to embrace them. Both the NHL and MLB have inked partnership deals with prediction markets in recent weeks.
Kalshi declined to comment on the push for prediction markets to raise their minimum age. The company has previously said that it does not specifically target its marketing to college students and its average user is 33 years old.
Polymarket, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Coalition for Prediction Markets, a lobbying group representing the industry, did not respond to requests for comment.
