Kalshi and Polymarket US Self-Certify New Contracts Without Prior CFTC Approval

Between Oct. 2 and Oct. 6, Kalshi and Polymarket US self-certified new contracts with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal regulator for futures and swaps. Six of them are the subject of this note, from a never-expiring future on the 500 largest U.S. companies to a yes-or-no contract on how many people receive SNAP benefits. Self-certification means the exchange files a statement that the contract complies with the law and can list it from the next business day. The CFTC does not approve it in advance, and the rules do not require it to.

Le Coin's view: the fight over whether prediction markets are finance or gambling is being settled one filing at a time, by the exchanges, and the same paperwork now covers both a Wall Street hedging tool and something that looks like a sportsbook line.

Self-certification means the exchange vouches for itself

A U.S. futures exchange has two ways to list a product. It can ask the CFTC to review and approve it first, under Regulation 40.3. Or it can certify under Regulation 40.2 that the product complies with the Commodity Exchange Act, make sure the CFTC receives that certification by the open of business on the business day before listing, post a copy on its website, and go.

The second route is not a permission slip. The CFTC can stay a listing while it pursues a false-certification proceeding, and it can force an exchange to pull a "class" certification and resubmit contracts one by one.

A class certification, under 40.2(d), is the bulk version. The exchange certifies one template contract, then certifies that every variation (a different month, threshold or comparison) uses the identical source and formula. One filing can cover an open-ended menu of contracts.

Kalshi pitches a stock-index perpetual to institutions, and opens it to retail

Kalshi self-certified the US500T contract on Oct. 5 under 40.2(a) and said it would list it after the close of business that day. It is a perpetual future on the MerQube US Large Cap Index, a total-return index of the 500 largest U.S.-listed, U.S.-domiciled companies. Perpetual means no expiry: longs and shorts swap a funding payment once a day to keep the contract's price tied to the index.

The filing itself compares the trading schedule to CME's E-mini futures. The contract is worth $10 per index point, with a minimum tick of 0.10 points, or $1. It is set to trade from 6:00 p.m. ET Sunday to 5:00 p.m. ET Friday, and funding is set at 4:00 p.m. ET on each index business day, capped at plus or minus 2.00%, and set to zero when it would be smaller than 0.002%. The position accountability level, the size at which the exchange can ask a trader to explain or cut a position, is $25 million.

The pitch is institutional. Kalshi's filing says the perpetual suits "asset managers and institutional investors maintaining long-horizon exposure" because it removes the quarterly roll of dated index futures. The same filing says the contract "will be available to the general public, including retail participants," and sets the minimum trading unit at one ten-thousandth of a contract. The only age line is the exchange-wide one: no one under 18 can open an account.

Kalshi used the route the CFTC said these products should not take

The CFTC approved Kalshi's bitcoin perpetual, BTCPERP, on May 29, 2026, and limited that analysis to perpetuals on bitcoin or other digital commodities with deep, continuous spot markets. A policy statement published June 3 (91 Fed. Reg. 33,160) said perpetuals on other asset classes "should be submitted for Commission review and approval pursuant to the voluntary product approval process under Commission Regulation 40.3."

Kalshi quotes that sentence in its own US500T filing. It then self-certifies under 40.2(a) anyway, arguing the contract "resembles the BTCPERP Contract in all respects relevant to the regulatory categorization analysis," meaning whether it counts as a future or a swap, and that the U.S. equity market has the depth the CFTC cited for bitcoin.

"Should" is not "must," and the statement itself calls 40.3 "voluntary." The same statement also says the public interest "is best served by requiring" prior review for these perpetuals, and that nothing in it "is intended to be binding." Le Coin's read is that Kalshi is testing which of those sentences counts.

CME has sued the CFTC and its chairman, Michael Selig, over the BTCPERP order and the policy statement, arguing that perpetuals are swaps, a category the law regulates separately from futures (Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. v. Selig, No. 1:26-cv-02157, D.D.C., filed June 18, 2026). The CFTC moved to dismiss on Sept. 2. As of Oct. 9 the public court docket showed no ruling on that motion. Kalshi filed US500T into that litigation.

Polymarket US filed yes-or-no contracts on government data

On Oct. 6, QCX LLC, which does business as Polymarket US, filed two class certifications under 40.2(d), each to list no earlier than Oct. 8. One asks whether the 12-month change in the consumer price index for prescription drugs (CPI-U), as first published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, will be above, below, between or exactly a given value. The other asks the same of national SNAP participation.

The SNAP filing names the data source that decides every contract as "the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Administration." Polymarket US files both contracts under the category "Macroeconomics."

Le Coin's view: strip the labels and this is a betting line. Each contract has a $1.00 notional size and pays $1.00 if the condition is met. Margin is 100% of the at-risk amount, so a buyer can lose the stake and no more. The position accountability level is $25,000 of notional exposure, and the filings say "No position limits apply."

Polymarket US names itself the Source Agency, the party that reads the government print and decides the outcome. The filing says the decision "will be final and will not be subject to appeal or revision for purposes of settlement." Later revisions to the BLS or USDA figure do not count, unless the first print was a clear error under the filings' data-error rule.

We read the insider rules as the exchange's own map of the risk. The CPI contract bars "members of the news media granted any embargoed access" to the release. The SNAP contract bars "personnel of State agencies or other contributors" who see the data before it is published.

The Zcash filing is not a class certification yet

Polymarket US also filed Zcash and XRP price contracts on Oct. 5, each to list no earlier than Oct. 7. These are single-contract certifications under 40.2(a). Polymarket US says it filed them that way "Consistent with CFTC Staff Letter No. 26-22 (July 24, 2026)," and that it intends to use each as the reference contract for "a subsequent certification of a class of swaps."

Letter 26-22 is not addressed to Polymarket. It is a July 24 advisory from the CFTC's Division of Market Oversight to every designated contract market, the legal term for a CFTC-registered futures exchange, under the subject "Self-Certification of an Event Contract Series." An event contract is a yes-or-no contract on whether something happens. The advisory says "Broad Template Certifications should not be submitted via § 40.2(a)."

The posted Zcash filing is a one-page cover letter. It lists Attachment A, the terms and conditions, but the public copy does not include it, and Attachment B, the legal analysis, is marked confidential. A reader cannot tell from the public record what the Zcash contract pays or how it settles.

The Dow class cert needs a careful read

Kalshi's Oct. 2 class certification covers yes-or-no contracts on whether the Dow Jones Industrial Average will close above, below, at exactly, at least, at most or between given levels over a set period, settling at $1.00 or $0.00 and priced between $0.01 and $0.99. The class rule in 40.2(d)(1) leaves out contracts based on a "security index."

Kalshi grounds the class in a different part of the definition: the Dow's close as an "occurrence, extent of an occurrence, or contingency." Whether that framing holds is a legal question we are not going to settle here. We flag it because it is stock-index exposure, like US500T, filed through the bulk route, under a theory we think the rule's text does not plainly address.

The case against this note

These are registered exchanges. Kalshi says US500T will clear through Kalshi Klear LLC, a CFTC-registered clearinghouse that stands between buyers and sellers, with margin, surveillance and identity checks. Polymarket US's contracts cap losses at the stake and bar people with early access to the data. Self-certification has been in the rulebook for years, and the CFTC keeps its stay and withdrawal powers.

On that view, "gambling" is a label, and a $1 contract on a BLS print is a small swap on an economic statistic, which the exchange certifies is an "excluded commodity," the statute's category for rates, indexes, economic measures and events rather than physical goods. The objection is fair. It still does not explain why the agency's own June policy statement pointed index perpetuals to prior review and Kalshi went the other way.

What would change the view

The CFTC staying US500T under 40.2(c), or asking Kalshi to resubmit under 40.3, would show the policy statement has teeth. Continued silence would suggest it does not.

A 40.2(d)(2) demand that Polymarket US or Kalshi break up a class certification would mark where the agency thinks the bulk route stops. A ruling on the merits in CME v. Selig, on whether perpetuals are futures or swaps, would reset the US500T question. And the Zcash class certification, if Polymarket US files it, will show whether the terms ever reach the public copy.

Sources

Primary sources. Sources 1 to 7 accessed Oct. 9, 2026, 12:30 to 12:40 p.m. ET; sources 8 to 12 accessed Oct. 9, 2026, 2:05 to 2:10 p.m. ET.

1. KalshiEX LLC, CFTC Regulation 40.2(a) Notification Regarding the Initial Listing of the US500T Futures Contract, Oct. 5, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10042631355.pdf
2. KalshiEX LLC, CFTC Regulation 40.2(d) Class Certification, "Will the Dow Jones Industrial Average close ..." Contracts, Oct. 2, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10022631058.pdf
3. QCX LLC d/b/a Polymarket US, Class Certification under 17 C.F.R. 40.2(d) for BLS CPI-U Prescription Drugs 12-Month Change Contracts (RXCPCD), Oct. 6, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10062632042.pdf
4. QCX LLC d/b/a Polymarket US, Class Certification under 17 C.F.R. 40.2(d) for SNAP National Participation Contracts (SNAPCD), Oct. 6, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10062631969.pdf
5. QCX LLC d/b/a Polymarket US, Product Self-Certification under 17 C.F.R. 40.2(a) for Zcash Price Contracts (CPCZEC), Oct. 5, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10052631620.pdf
6. QCX LLC d/b/a Polymarket US, Product Self-Certification under 17 C.F.R. 40.2(a) for XRP Price Contracts (CPCXRP), Oct. 5, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/ptc/ptc10052631664.pdf
7. 17 C.F.R. 40.2, Listing products for trading by certification (eCFR): https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-17/chapter-I/part-40/section-40.2
8. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Policy Statement Concerning the Listing of Perpetual Contracts, 91 Fed. Reg. 33,160 (June 3, 2026; adopted May 29, 2026), FR Doc. 2026-11020: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/06/03/2026-11020/policy-statement-concerning-the-listing-of-perpetual-contracts
9. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Order Approving KalshiEX LLC BTCPERP Futures Contract, May 29, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/filings/documents/2026/orgdcmkexbtxperporder26601.pdf
10. CFTC Release No. 9240-26, "CFTC Approves BTCPERP Contract Submitted by KalshiEX, LLC," May 29, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/PressRoom/PressReleases/9240-26
11. Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. v. Michael S. Selig, in his official capacity as Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and Commodity Futures Trading Commission, No. 1:26-cv-02157 (D.D.C.), complaint filed June 18, 2026 (court record via RECAP): https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/73500937/chicago-mercantile-exchange-inc-v-selig/
12. CFTC Division of Market Oversight, Staff Advisory, CFTC Letter No. 26-22, "Self-Certification of an Event Contract Series," July 24, 2026: https://www.cftc.gov/csl/26-22/download

Holding the Corner.

Not financial advice.