California Tribal Gaming Leaders View Prediction Markets as Big Threat

CNIGA leadership is going on the offensive against prediction markets

James Siva serves as chairman of the California Nations Indian Gaming Association. He isn't pulling any punches in defense of his organization's members in their battle against the influx of prediction markets. He indicated that preliminary studies conducted by CNIGA estimate that prediction markets are cutting into tribal gaming revenue in California at a rate of about 5%.

“The rise of the prediction market is, without a doubt, the largest and most impending threat we have to tribal gaming and to tribal government and tribal sovereignty that we have currently,” Siva told Tribal Gaming News. “It may be the biggest threat we've seen since the beginning of this industry.”

The California Nations Indian Gaming Association (CNIGA), founded in 1988, is a non-profit organization comprised of federally recognized tribal governments. The organization's mission is to protect the sovereign right of tribal governments to operate gaming on federally recognized Indian lands. CNIGA acts as a planning and coordinating agency for legislative, policy, legal and communications efforts on behalf of its members and serves as an industry forum for information and resources.

California tribal gaming is big business

By cutting into tribal gaming, prediction market sites are also impacting what the state's tribes can do for their people. Gaming revenue earned by the tribes helps to fund tribal government programs. These government services include public safety, health care, housing and education. If prediction markets continue to expand at the current rapid pace, California tribal leaders are fearful. They worry that it will hit their gaming revenue even harder.

Tribal gaming generated more than $43 billion nationally in fiscal year 2023. That is the most recent data available.

CNIGA is calling on Congress to step in and help

Tribal gaming compacts are federally negotiated and regulated. Prediction markets are also federally regulated. Tribal leaders believe that Congress must take a role in preventing the unfettered growth of this industry.

“Prediction market companies are asking Congress and regulators to trust them while they repackage sports betting as financial trading, market it to consumers like gambling, and then claim they should not have to follow gaming laws," Siva said in a statement. "That is not innovation. It is regulatory evasion.

“Congress should ask hard questions about whether these companies are misleading consumers, how often ordinary users actually win, why they should be allowed to operate without the safeguards required of lawful gaming, and what happens to tribal governments if sports wagering moves through a federal loophole instead of the tribal and state regulatory framework Congress created.

“For Indian Country, this is about more than gambling. Tribal gaming revenues fund health care, education, housing, public safety, infrastructure, elder services, and economic development. Those services should not be put at risk because well-funded companies have found a way to call sports betting something else."