Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway filed counterclaims against Novig on Nov. 9, asking a federal court to stop it from accepting payments from Missouri residents for what the state calls unlawful internet gambling. Missouri argues that wagers with an operator lacking a state license violate Missouri law and therefore fall under a 2006 federal anti-gambling law. But that law’s definition of a bet or wager may exclude transactions subject to the rules of a federally registered exchange; the counterclaim does not address that argument.
Novig’s earlier lawsuit argues that federal commodities law gives the CFTC exclusive authority over contracts traded on federally designated exchanges. Polymarket U.S. also sued Hanaway, arguing that federal law overrides Missouri’s sports-wagering rules as applied to its exchange and that the licensing system discriminates against out-of-state businesses. Both companies received September letters calling their sports contracts unlicensed sports wagering.
