Maryland Joins Sports Event Contract Betting Clampdown And after that there were 6. On Monday, Maryland became the sixth state in the U.S. (that we understand so far) to send out cease-and-desist letters to federally regulated "prediction markets" offering de facto sports betting via event contracts. - Officials in Maryland, Ohio, Illinois, New Jersey, Nevada, and Montana have actually sent cease-and-desist letters in connection with federally controlled sports occasion contracts. - Those contracts are a growing type of competition for state-regulated sportsbooks. The letters were sent by the Maryland Lottery and Gaming Control Commission to Kalshi, Robinhood, and Crypto.com, all of which have received similar correspondence from other state regulators. "Kalshi is running in Maryland and is using and performing what is, in reality, betting on sporting events," Maryland Lottery and Gaming Control agency director John Martin composed in among the letters. "However, Kalshi does not hold a sports betting license issued by the Commission, its wagers have not been authorized by the Commission, and it is not otherwise licensed under Maryland law to use wagers on sporting occasions." For these reasons, Martin added, Kalshi and the others are being directed by the commission to "right away stop and desist these legal offerings" in the state. The forecast markets have 15 days to alert the regulator that they are complying. The letters from the Maryland sports betting regulator follow comparable ones sent out by authorities in Nevada, New Jersey, Ohio, Illinois, and, according to Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour, Montana. Join the club Those efforts represent increasing awareness of and opposition to federally managed forecast markets like Kalshi. That opposition has actually increase because occasion agreement trading expanded to include sports results, like the Super Bowl and March Madness.