Wicked Witch

What is Wicked Witch?

While sports event contracts are currently the tentpole category for the prediction market industry, data indicate bettors and traders are embracing other categories.

Fullstory points out that while 62% of consumers have dabbled in sports event contracts, 42% traded economic or financial derivatives on a prediction market while a comparable percentage transacted in an election or political event contract. More than a quarter traded at least one entertainment or pop culture derivative.

That widening breadth is vital for the industry at a time when some analysts estimate volume could jump to $10 trillion by 2035 – a projection that is largely rooted in other categories surpassing sports for the top spot.  

How to play Wicked Witch

The DSWV, representing licensed sports-betting operators, broadly welcomed the law enforcement action as a necessary response to the illegal market’s growth and associated risks. 

“This successful investigation clearly demonstrates the scale that the illegal gambling market has now reached,” said Mathias Dahms, president of the DSWV.

Dahms highlighted the significant dangers unlicensed operators pose to player protection and the overall integrity of the licensed market. He cited the absence of controls such as deposit limits, identity verification and player suspension tools. 

What is Wicked Witch?

In any event, successive regulatory tightening and tax increases have already created a “reasonably effective deterrent” to market entry.

There is a second complication. The relentless flow of Commission statements may eventually make enforcement less damaging rather than more.

“The regulatory failures are unhelpful but perhaps the sheer number and regularity of them has made them less remarkable, such that they become ‘wallpaper’,” Waugh says.