Czech Republic gives ISPs 15 days to block Kalshi after Ministry of Finance prohibition order

Internet service providers in the Czech Republic have less than two weeks to block Kalshi after the Ministry of Finance added the US prediction markets operator to the list of unauthorised gambling operators on 30 September. For high-risk operators, the point is simple: in the Czech Republic, prediction markets are being treated as gambling, not as a neat little financial workaround.

1. By law, ISPs have 15 days from the publication of a prohibition order to block the affected websites. That means users in the Czech Republic will lose conventional access to Kalshi on Thursday, 15 October 2026.
2. The move follows an earlier prohibition order in July against Polymarket, Kalshi’s main rival. In other words, this is not a one-off targeting one brand; Czech authorities are applying the same line to the category.
3. Czech authorities say prediction markets are betting offers dressed up as investment tools. SBC News notes this view is shared by regulators in Belgium, France, Romania, Spain, and Germany, among others, which is the sort of cross-border pattern PSPs and operators need to take seriously when planning market entry.
4. SBC News understands that Kalshi’s Czech operations were brought to the authorities by the Czech Institute for Gambling Regulation (IPRH), which represents more than 90% of the regulated gambling sector in the country. Jan Řehola, IPRH Director, said Kalshi’s inclusion shows the approach is now “being reflected in practice.”
5. Řehola also argued that the substance of the product matters more than the label attached to it: if a person puts money at risk on the uncertain outcome of a real-world event, the rules should not be bypassed by calling it a contract or a financial instrument.

Kalshi, Polymarket, and other prediction market operators have generally positioned event contracts as financial instruments in the US, under Commodity Futures and Trading Commission (CFTC) oversight. Europe is a different story: in several jurisdictions, the same products have been called gambling and blocked until a gambling licence is obtained. Gibraltar is the outlier here, having already adopted a dedicated framework for prediction markets. The broader European market, however, is still much more comfortable with a ban first, questions later approach.