Polymarket appoints Rob Eskridge as head of US government relations amid state legal fights

Polymarket has named Rob Eskridge, a former Intercontinental Exchange and New York Stock Exchange official, to lead its US government relations work while the company continues to fight state-level legal action over whether its sports events contracts amount to illegal sports betting. For anyone watching prediction markets, the point is simple: the product may be trading like a market, but regulators are still deciding which bucket it belongs in.

1. Eskridge will lead Polymarket’s engagement with US policymakers. Before this move, he handled federal government affairs at Intercontinental Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange, and earlier served as counsel to the US House Committee on Ethics and chief of staff to Congressman Al Green, a senior member of the House Financial Services Committee.
2. His background also includes serving as Ohio’s associate attorney general earlier in his career. That kind of résumé matters here because Polymarket is not just selling a consumer app; it is operating in a space where the legal framing can change the business model overnight.
3. Polymarket said prediction markets “sit at a unique intersection of technology, financial markets, and public policy” and that, as the policy framework around the industry develops, it intends to be “an active and constructive participant” in that discussion.
4. The timing lines up with a live legal problem. Polymarket is still defending itself in various states that argue its sports events contracts amount to illegal sports betting, which is exactly the kind of issue that can decide whether a high-risk payments stack stays open or gets shut down.
5. On the commercial side, Polymarket said it recorded 762,000 app downloads during the first week of the new NFL season, a 13,509 per cent weekly increase and 25 per cent of total category downloads, ahead of Kalshi, DraftKings and FanDuel.

Bank of America said Kalshi and Polymarket together topped $1bn in National Football League trading over the first six days of Week 1. DeFi Rate said Kalshi recorded $983.4m, with a market share of 82 per cent.