DraftKings, FanDuel and PrizePicks pull Utah prediction markets after Kalshi charges

DraftKings, FanDuel and PrizePicks have pulled sports and political event contracts from Utah prediction markets, and Fanatics will stop taking trades in the state on Nov. 4, days after Attorney General Derek Brown filed 13 felony counts and one misdemeanor against Kalshi and its co-founders.

All four confirmed the changes to SBC Americas, which reported on Oct. 30 that operators who had entered Utah over the past year were now "making a hasty retreat."

Which operators are leaving Utah, and when

DraftKings moved first. As of Thursday afternoon, DraftKings Predictions no longer offered sports, political, novelty "and certain other" event contracts to customers physically located in Utah. Financial event contracts on stocks, commodities and cryptocurrency are still available. "Any open positions customers hold in the affected markets will remain open and settle as normal," the company said in an emailed statement.

FanDuel made the same change effective Friday morning. "Event contracts on sports, politics and novelties are no longer available to customers in Utah through FanDuel Predicts," a spokesperson said by email. Economic benchmarks and key financial indicators stay open to Utah customers, and positions will settle as expected.

PrizePicks went further, turning off Team Picks, its contracts on sports games, leagues, teams and season-long outcomes, along with Culture Picks, which cover politics, entertainment and pop culture. A help page updated Wednesday shows only its daily fantasy-style Player Picks available in the state, and a spokesperson confirmed the change.

Fanatics still listed Utah as a region of availability on Friday. A spokesperson told SBC Americas the company is "stopping trade placement on Fanatics Markets in the state of Utah on Nov. 4" because of recent developments.

How Utah's case against Kalshi escalated

Utah's constitution forbids the legislature from authorizing "any game of chance, lottery or gift enterprise under any pretense or for any purpose," and Brown argues Kalshi's sports and political contracts are gambling under that clause.

Kalshi sued Utah officials in February, arguing the Commodity Exchange Act overrides state authority over its products. A federal judge rejected that argument in August, and the Tenth Circuit declined an emergency injunction pending appeal in September.

On Oct. 20, Brown sued Kalshi in state court, also naming affiliated entities and Susquehanna trading firms. The state's petition for a preliminary injunction asks a judge to block Kalshi's culture and "mention" markets as well as sports and politics. The CFTC and the US Department of Justice responded on Monday with a suit to block the state's enforcement, and Crypto.com and its OG.com platform sued Utah the same day. Wednesday brought the criminal counts.

At a press conference, Brown aimed his message past Kalshi: "For other companies that are operating here in Utah, I would ask two things. Number one, read this complaint, and number two, we're simply asking you to follow the law, follow Utah law. Gambling has been illegal in Utah since statehood."

SBC Americas, citing the Salt Lake Tribune, reported that Brown's campaign received contributions from betting companies in 2025 and 2026: $5,000 from DraftKings, $5,000 from PrizePicks and $10,000 from Underdog SVP of government affairs and partnerships Stacie Stern in January 2026.

Kalshi's $40bn valuation in the week of the charges

The criminal counts landed in the same week Kalshi closed a $1bn Series G round co-led by Wellington Management and Sequoia Capital, valuing the exchange at $40bn. SBC Americas put that at eight times the $5bn valuation of October 2025. SBC News reported the round also drew Baillie Gifford, Stripes, Andreessen Horowitz, Coatue, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, CapitalG and Hudson River Trading, and that Kalshi said the money would go toward "building the next-generation financial exchange."

Utah is not the company's first criminal exposure. Arizona filed 20 felony charges against Kalshi earlier this year, SBC News reported. SBC Americas noted the valuation came "despite multiple U.S. circuit appeals courts ruling against the company and amid reports of artificially inflated volumes."

Mansour's public argument has not shifted. "Yes, a bet and a trade often look similar," he wrote on X, sharing an op-ed he wrote for The Wall Street Journal. "But how they work is fundamentally different. A sportsbook sets the odds and takes the other side of your bet. Prediction markets are markets, where buyers and sellers compete to discover and produce efficient prices and enable important public benefits."

Kalshi said around 500 institutional entities were active on its platform as of September 2026, and that "entities excluding market makers" made up roughly 25% of total exchange trading volume. The federal regulator sits on the other side of the argument from the states. SBC News described the CFTC under the current administration as supportive of prediction markets, a reversal from the Biden years.

SBC Americas also reported that Sens. Elizabeth Warren and John Curtis sent Kalshi and Polymarket a letter on Oct. 28 with seven questions about insider trading and manipulation in election markets, including how many suspected cases each company has found and how many it referred to the CFTC or law enforcement. "We are particularly troubled by election-related event contracts," the senators wrote. They asked for responses by Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 3. Curtis is a Republican from Utah.

Fanatics is the only one of the four still taking event contract trades in the state, and only until Nov. 4. Underdog still listed Utah as a region of availability for its prediction markets on Friday and did not respond to an inquiry from SBC Americas, so whether it joins the others is not yet known.