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Experts say growing trend on sites such as Polymarket and Kalshi could motivate people to start fires to win money A group of US lawmakers is sounding the alarm over prediction market platforms that allow users to bet on wildfires, as experts warn the emerging trend could raise the risk of arson. Democratic senators from six states sent a letter this week to the chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), an independent government agency regulating platforms such as Polymarket and Kalshi, urging it to rein in the practice. “As the United States faces yet another record-breaking fire season this year, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) cannot allow these prediction markets to offer unrestricted betting on wildfires,” said the lawmakers, who included Oregon senator Jeff Merkley, California senators Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla, and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada. They said such bets pose a risk that “individuals could be tempted to commit arson in order to make sure their bets are successful”.
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The amounts waged on the LA fires totalled more than $1.2m, according to Jamie L Pietruska, a historian at Rutgers University who followed those predictions.
