Prediction Markets in Florida: Legal Status

Status as of October 16, 2026

Florida's gambling regulator is the Florida Gaming Control Commission, which describes itself as "a five-member regulatory body that is responsible for exercising all regulatory and executive powers of the state with respect to gambling," including pari-mutuel wagering, cardrooms, slot machine facilities and the oversight of gaming compacts, and excluding the state lottery [1]. No Commission order, warning letter or enforcement action naming a prediction-market venue was located as of October 16, 2026, and no release title on the Commission's news page, whose newest entry is dated September 15, 2026, mentions prediction markets or event contracts [11].

The Commission's closest statement concerns sports betting, not exchanges. Its release of September 14, 2026 says that "The state of Florida legalized online sports betting through the Seminole Tribe's Hard Rock Bet platform in 2023," names Hard Rock Bet as the only legal operator of that kind in Florida, and says participants "must be at least 21 years old" [2]. The release does not mention prediction markets, and this page does not treat it as a statement about them.

Kalshi and Polymarket: the two venues that price this site's Florida contracts. No Florida court case with either as a party, no Commission action and no Attorney General action naming either was located as of October 16, 2026, so this page draws no conclusion about either one.

North American Derivatives Exchange (Crypto.com): the one prediction-market venue found named as a defendant in a Florida court, in the private class action described below. No ruling on the plaintiffs' allegations was located.

What the record shows

Two state documents tie sports betting in Florida to the Seminole Tribe of Florida. Section 285.710 of the Florida Statutes states that the compact "executed by the Governor and the Tribe on April 23, 2021, as amended on May 17, 2021, is ratified and approved" [3]. The Commission's September 14, 2026 release links the online sports betting it describes to the Tribe's Hard Rock Bet platform [2].

On February 13, 2026, two plaintiffs pleaded as California residents filed a class action in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in Miami: Keohohou v. North American Derivatives Exchange, Inc., No. 1:26-cv-20996 [4]. The defendants are North American Derivatives Exchange, Inc., doing business as Crypto.com, Foris DAX, Inc. and unnamed Does; the State of Florida is not a party. The complaint quotes Crypto.com's terms as choosing Florida law and the "state or federal courts sitting in Miami-Dade County, Florida," alleges that the sports event contracts Crypto.com began offering in December 2024 are "nothing more than illegal sports gambling by another name," and pleads Florida's gambling chapter, chapter 849 of the Florida Statutes, and its deceptive-practices statute, section 501.204. Those are the plaintiffs' allegations, not findings.

The docket entries whose text can be read record these steps [5]. On April 23, 2026 the court set the case for trial in the two-week period beginning February 22, 2027, in Miami (Doc. 24). The plaintiffs filed a first amended complaint on April 29, 2026 (Doc. 29). The defendants moved to compel arbitration and stay the case on May 15, 2026 (Doc. 43) and moved to dismiss the amended complaint for failure to state a claim on May 29, 2026 (Doc. 46).

At the U.S. Supreme Court, New Jersey's officials petitioned on September 2, 2026 for review in Flaherty v. KalshiEX, LLC, No. 26-299, a case from New Jersey [12]. On October 7, 2026 Ohio, 38 other states and the District of Columbia filed a brief supporting the petition; Florida is not among its signatories [13]. The docket does not say why a state did or did not sign, and this page does not guess.

What is not documented

No Florida-specific primary record naming Kalshi or Polymarket was located as of October 16, 2026, so this page draws no conclusion about either venue; the search is repeated on October 30, 2026. CourtListener's RECAP archive, searched for both names in Florida's three federal districts and the Eleventh Circuit, returned no case with either venue as a party: the search for Kalshi found Keohohou, which cites a news report about Kalshi, and three unrelated cases whose text mentions the name, and the search for Polymarket found nothing [6, 7]. RECAP holds only what has been uploaded to it, so it is a search rather than a complete docket. The Attorney General's site search for "Kalshi", "Polymarket" and "prediction market" returned no results [7, 8, 9]. Neither venue's own terms were read for a Florida notice, and no Florida state court docket was searched.

In Keohohou, the docket entries from June 12, 2026 onward, including entries titled as orders on June 30, September 11, September 16 and September 18, 2026, appear in the public archive by title only. Their text could not be read, so this page does not say what they decided or whether the trial period set on April 23, 2026 still stands.

What happens next

Kalshi's response to the petition in No. 26-299 is due at the Supreme Court on November 9, 2026, after the Court extended the deadline on September 22, 2026 [12]. In Keohohou, an expedited motion was filed on October 16, 2026; it appears in the archive by title only, so neither its filer nor its request is reported here [5]. No Florida proceeding brought by the state against a prediction-market venue was located.

This page is next reviewed on October 30, 2026, and sooner after any Gaming Control Commission or Attorney General action, any Florida filing naming a venue, or any entry in No. 26-299.

What this page does not do

This page is not legal advice. It does not say whether anyone in Florida may lawfully trade any contract on any venue, it offers no view on how the Southern District of Florida or the Supreme Court ought to decide the matters before them, and it says nothing about how prediction-market proceeds are taxed. The Commission's statement about sports betting is reported as a statement about sports betting and nothing more.

The page is reviewed every 14 days and after any filing, order or regulator action, and it shows the date of its last review. A correction is made on this page and dated. The disclosure page sets out the site's relationships with the venues it names, and the about page explains where the prices on this site come from.