NBA signs MOU with CFTC and names Kalshi and Polymarket as preferred prediction market partners

The NBA has formally moved into prediction markets with a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and new partnership agreements with Kalshi and Polymarket. For operators, the important part is not the headline fit with sports fans; it is the package of integrity controls, data access, and league restrictions that now sits around these contracts.

1. The league said Kalshi and Polymarket are now its “Preferred Prediction Market Exchanges” and that the deals include “significant integrity protections,” including limits on permissible markets, bans on NBA event contracts for league and team personnel, and information-sharing obligations tied to investigations and suspicious trading.
2. As preferred partners, Kalshi and Polymarket will get access to NBA IP, marketing rights in the US, and official data feeds from Sportradar, the league’s data distribution partner. That combination matters because in prediction markets, access to official data and league branding is often the difference between a product that can scale and one that just looks nice in a deck.
3. The NBA also said it is expanding its existing partnership with DraftKings “to include prediction markets and nationwide promotion.” The league said expanded partnerships with its other existing sports betting partners are expected to be announced “in the coming weeks,” with additional prediction-specific integrity obligations that line up with the NBA’s “latest sports betting restrictions.”
4. Scott Kaufman-Ross, the NBA’s head of media distribution and partnerships, said protecting league integrity was the NBA’s “top priority,” and that the prediction market partnerships plus the MOU with the CFTC were steps toward “establishing a framework that creates new opportunities to engage our fans.” In practice, that reads as the league trying to set the rules before the market sets them for it.
5. The NBA joins a crowded field of US sports partnerships in this area: Polymarket is already partnered with MLB, the UFC and MLS, while Kalshi and Polymarket share partnerships with the NHL and now the NBA. The announcement also landed on a rare “sports equinox,” when the NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL are all active on the same day.

Prior to the NBA’s announcement, some players had already signed individual endorsement deals with prediction market platforms. Miami Heat forward and two-time league MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo announced a deal with Kalshi in February, and LeBron James appeared in a Polymarket ad in September. James, who is playing his NBA-record 24th season with the Philadelphia 76ers this year, had previously been partnered with DraftKings.