After two postponed votes and continued delays in appointing a new CFTC chair to oversee the federal regulatory agency on derivatives, the nomination for Brian Quintenz appears on ice.
Tapped by the White House to head the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Quintenz has seen his nomination stall amid urgings from the Winklevoss Twins to delay the process. If Quintenz is passed over, the move could deliver a major blow to prediction market supporters given his association with Kalshi. Quintenz, a former CFTC commissioner, has largely indicated that sports event contracts fall under federal jurisdiction, rather than with individual states.
Ahead of next Monday’s anticipated roundtable on cryptocurrency and prediction market regulation, speculation has intensified that Quintenz will be replaced by the White House. Last week, Bloomberg reported that U.S. President Donald Trump is mulling potential replacements for the position.
So who might be the next CFTC chair?
Could the new CFTC chair be a former director?
Josh Sterling, a partner at Washington D.C.-based firm Milbank LLP, is being vetted by Trump’s administration, Semafor reported this week. For prediction market detractors, Sterling would not be the preferred choice.
For one, Sterling has represented Kalshi in numerous cases over the past 18 months. At Jones Day, Sterling’s previous stop, he represented the prediction market in KalshiEx LLC v. CFTC. There, attorneys for Kalshi argued that so-called Congressional Control Contracts should not be prohibited by the derivatives regulator.
The trades gave customers the ability to predict which political party would gain control of the Senate and the House of Representatives in the 2024 election. Kalshi eventually won a stay in U.S. District Court that allowed the site to offer contracts on the presidential election. Weeks later, Kalshi began listing the contracts on sports.
What Sterling said at gaming legislation conference
In July, Sterling made an appearance on behalf of Kalshi at the National Council of Legislators From Gaming States summer meeting in Louisville.
At the event, the former CFTC director mused that it is not up to the courts to decide whether market participants are using the contracts to engage in speculation or hedging.
Sterling also drew a comparison between sports contracts and derivatives on commodities such as WTI oil futures. As of 2025, no states have imposed regulations on wheat derivatives, he noted.
“How many contracts are event-dependent – oil, wheat, interest rates, or foreign exchange rates?” Sterling told iGB following the panel. “This is an industry-wide issue that has very little to do with events.”
A Sterling appointment as CFTC chair should largely be viewed as a favourable development for prediction markets. As an agency director, Sterling oversaw approximately 3,300 financial firms that registered with the CFTC to participate in the global derivatives market, according to his LinkedIn page.
During Sterling’s tenure (2019-21), he expanded the agency’s oversight, examination and enforcement referral programs with those firms and completed more than 60 major rule and relief initiatives, the attorney wrote on LinkedIn.
Beyond Sterling, there are strong indications that the other candidates are under consideration for their experience in crypto matters.
Crypto-friendly lawyer under consideration
In comparison with Sterling, Mike Selig’s expertise on prediction market litigation and regulation is more limited. The SEC appointed Selig as chief counsel of its newly Crypto Task Force in March, one tasked with “creating workable solutions to difficult crypto regulatory problems,” according to then SEC Commissioner Hester Pierce.
Before joining the SEC, Selig served as a partner at Willkie Farr & Gallagher, a leading international law firm.
Selig, who began his career as an intern at the CFTC, is a protege of former chair Chris Giancarlo, the author of 2021 book CryptoDad.
Notably, the Winklevoss Twins made an appearance at a Manhattan event celebrating the book launch. Giancarlo, who lauded Selig for the appointment, provided an insider’s account of the rise of cryptocurrencies in the book.
While with Willkie Farr, Selig discussed leveraged trading activity as futures contracts in a 2022 memo. If no exception applies to such transactions, then retail commodity transactions must be traded on a designated contract market, the memo states. In CFTC parlance, a designated contract market is also known as a prediction market. Opponents of prediction markets likely would prefer the appointment of Selig over Sterling.
Another CFTC chair hopeful from crypto space
As with Selig, Williams’ bailiwick is on crypto regulation, not prediction markets. In February, the Treasury Department appointed Williams as a counselor to Secretary Scott Bessent on digital assets and blockchain technology policy. Prior to joining Treasury, Williams served as global head of policy at Galaxy Digital, a digital assets and data center infrastructure business.
Williams’s views on prediction markets are largely unknown. In June, Williams spoke to FIA Market Voice, a futures’ industry podcast.
The conversation centered on stablecoins, digital assets and future use cases of blockchain technology. Prediction markets were not covered.
Also this summer, Williams sat down with TRM, a blockchain intelligence company for an extensive chat on crypto policy. The discussion focused on a landmark White House report on digital assets released weeks earlier.
The 166-page report referenced DCMs 10 separate times, but did not mention sports event contracts.
Other trading regulator chair candidates
Earlier this week, an attorney from crypto law firm Brogan Law wrote in a blog that SEC Chairman Paul Atkins has emerged as a potential candidate. The author, Veronica Irwin, wrote that multiple sources told her that Atkins is “first in line,” for the position.
Such an appointment would be unlikely under the auspices of the Securities Exchange Act. According to the 1934 law, the SEC wrote that “no commissioner shall engage in any other business, vocation or employment than that of serving as commissioner.”
Caroline Pham, the interim chair of the CFTC, already announced that she intends to leave the commission when a successor is appointed. Former US President Joe Biden nominated Pham to the commission in 2021.
Of candidates reportedly under consideration, former CFTC Director and Kalshi lawyer Josh Sterling appears to be the strongest backer of federal oversight for prediction markets