coindesk.com
Bitnomial can forge ahead with a prediction-markets service to U.S. customers after an approval issued on Thursday by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
The U.S. derivatives regulator posted a "no-action letter" that means the exchange is safe to proceed with its new offering — a prediction market with contracts focusing on how cryptocurrencies and the economy will fare. The letter specified that the swap contract will be “referencing digital assets, economic indicators and financial outcomes.”
The OK from the CFTC follows recent blessings for other prediction market ventures from DraftKings and Gemini. Polymarket, PredictIt and LedgerX also received no-action letters from the agency last month on their prediction market operations.
Bitnomial's transaction on its registered exchange will be cleared through Bitnomial Clearinghouse, LLC.
"Participants will gain exposure to outcomes ranging from token price movements to macroeconomic indicators, with full integration across Bitnomial's product suite enabling traders to more specifically offset risk," the company had said in a release announcing the new business last month.
Bitnomial had a busy December with the CFTC, having become — under the close guidance of former Acting Chairman Caroline Pham — the first agency-regulated firm to offer leveraged spot crypto transactions. That was one of the hallmark crypto initiatives pushed by Pham before she turned the CFTC over to newly confirmed Chairman Mike Selig.
Thursday's approval is now under Selig's tenure, though the letter is a non-binding, staff-level approval of Bitnomial's new business.