CME chair attacks Kalshi at CFTC roundtable over manipulation risks

CME Group chairman Terry Duffy and Kalshi co-founder Luana Lopes Lara clashed publicly at a CFTC roundtable in Washington on Thursday, in an exchange that required a moderator to intervene.

Duffy questioned whether prediction markets face equivalent regulatory scrutiny to established exchanges, singling out Kalshi by name. He mocked a Kalshi contract on the Nathan's hot dog eating contest and challenged why Kalshi had been permitted to offer compute prediction markets while CME's own proposed compute contracts remain under regulatory review.

Lara responded by asking whether CME had a clean record on market manipulation. Duffy replied that CME employs more people in its regulatory department than Kalshi has across its entire company. CFTC roundtable moderator Walt Lukken stepped in before the exchange continued further.

The confrontation occurred as federal and state regulators remain in active dispute over how event contracts should be classified and overseen. Duffy's intervention places the world's largest futures exchange in direct public opposition to Kalshi at a moment when the CFTC has already suspended Kalshi's mention markets and Nevada and Washington state have both moved against the platform.