Polymarket challenges Dutch ban in court

• Polymarket wants to get back into the Netherlands, heads to The Hague to argue its case
• Polymarket maintains a familiar argument - it is offering trades, not bets on sports
• KSA has already banned the platform, maintaining that it is offering unlicensed games of chance

Polymarket is taking the issue of a ban handed down to the company in the Netherlands to court, with the prediction market platform filing a complaint in The Hague.

Trading is not the same as gambling, says Polymarket

The complaint seeks to overturn the ban against its services, arguing that the company does not offer gambling products but sells financial products instead. The main point of contention comes from the two opposite interpretations of what event contracts are.

On the one hand, there is the Kansspelautoriteit, the Dutch Gambling Authority, which contends that they are. Then there is Polymarket, which argues that, in the Netherlands as it does in the United States, it is offering financial products, and hence gambling laws cannot apply to its products.

The main issue in the U.S. has been the use of the so-called sports event contracts, which emulate gambling insofar as people can "trade" on the outcome of sporting events, rather than "bet" on those. Gambling regulators, governors, and lawmakers have said that this is just gambling.

Regulators also argue that sports event contracts are available earlier in the U.S., at the age of 18, rather than 21, when people can start betting on sports betting. France previously also issued a blocking order against the company.

The Netherlands’ gambling watchdog took a very similar view of the matter, and on January 20, 2026, the KSA said that Polymarket is offering games of chance without a license, issuing €420,000 a week, up to a maximum of €840,000 in the case of non-compliance.

Polymarket in a difficult spot, lawmakers' efforts to push for legalization flounder

But even if Polymarket were to comply with the KSA and obtained a license, it would not be able to offer anything but sports event contracts in theory, as the Netherlands does not allow betting on politics, entertainment events such as the Oscars, and others.

Some lawmakers, though, have been flirting with the idea of regulating prediction markets. Forum for Democracy (FvD), a far-right party, put forward a proposal recently to indeed regulate the sector. The measure was shot down in parliament just last week.

In the meantime, Polymarket is waiting for its day in court, determined to keep contesting the KSA-issued ban.

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