Comment Text:
I use PredictIt to buy contracts on the likelihood of political events. Trying to classify this as "gaming" undermines the nature of how this type of trading works. The mentality of buying and selling ""Yes" or "No" shares" in these events is little different from my approach to stock trades. If I believe that an event is likely to happen such as "Doug Burgum will be Trump's VP choice" then I will buy "Yes" shares in that. If I think that it is unlikely that Rubio is the VP pick, but Rubio shares are trading high, then I buy "No" shares in predicting his failure to achieve that, similar to how traders "short" stocks that they think are overvalued by others in the market.
Unlike games of chance, the PredictIt market is influenced by observable real world conditions of supply and demand in the political world. A person betting on a craps table has the simple math of fixed odds. The political fortunes of the world, however, are constantly changing, and not merely a factor of certain results happening a certain percentage of the time. It is only through studying the landscape of this market, similar to how one might study prospects of companies in the tech sector, that one can invest and achieve results.
Overall, the trading behavior of the structure of PredictIt far more resembles a stock market than a casino. If this was to be classified as "gaming" instead, then I think the CFTC would have to seriously re-evaluate a lot of other things that are allowed to be legally traded as speculation that is based in things even less tied to the real world or the real economy.
