The numbers that make this more than a regulatory story
Robinhood's third-quarter results on October 27 show where retail trading is heading. Event-contract revenue rose more than sixfold to $173 million. Crypto revenue fell 55% year on year to $120 million.1 Total revenue rose 12% to a record $1.42 billion, but net income fell 14% to $476 million. Diluted earnings per share fell 16% to $0.51, against $0.55 expected.1 Prediction-style contracts have overtaken crypto as a revenue line at one of the world's best-known retail brokers.
The longer record is verified against SEC filings. Robinhood's annual revenue was $1.865 billion in fiscal 2023, $2.951 billion in 2024 and $4.473 billion in 2025, about 2.4 times the 2023 level.2 Net income swung from a loss of $541 million in 2023 to profits of $1.411 billion in 2024 and $1.883 billion in 2025.2 Earnings per share went from -$0.61 to $1.56 to $2.05 over the same years.2 Event contracts are therefore being added to a company that is already profitable and growing fast.
Why European readers should care
We should be upfront that the dossier is thin on European entities. Most of what it holds concerns US venues and US regulators. The clearest European link is MiCA, the EU's crypto-asset rules. Coinbase set a three-day MiCA deadline. It said it would automatically convert non-compliant stablecoins (USDT, PayPal's and a Trump-linked coin) to USDC, and it told users not to deposit them after October 30.3 This is a concrete example of EU regulation changing which products a major platform offers, and it happened within days.
The dossier does not say how MiCA treats event contracts, prediction markets or 24-hour trading, so we do not claim anything on that. If you hold crypto through a platform that serves EU customers, the Coinbase episode shows that rule changes can reach your account on very short notice.
The same crypto-rules theme appeared in Washington. On October 27 Treasury Secretary Bessent said stablecoins and digital assets could reinforce dollar dominance. He also said Treasury could coordinate with the SEC and CFTC on crypto rules.4 European policymakers will read that as a signal that the US sees stablecoins as an instrument of currency policy.
A new product category, still awaiting approval
On September 30 Cboe said it plans to launch a new category of binary contracts tied to company-specific key performance indicators. They are expected in October 2026, subject to regulatory approval. Products tied to 23 companies are planned, and Robinhood is to be the first retail broker to offer them.5 Steve Quirk said: "Earnings contracts give retail investors another tool to inform their strategies and offer an even more precise way to trade on anticipated company KPIs."5
Two cautions on that source. First, it is a company press release, and the dossier does not confirm that regulatory approval has been granted. Second, our measured reliability for this feed is modest: 53% of 6,520 checked claims held up.5 Treat the launch as planned, not live.
Regulators are litigating while markets expand
The US response is a legal fight over who has authority. On October 27 the CFTC sued Utah to block state efforts to shut down CFTC-registered contract markets using state laws. It said it has started legal proceedings against nine other states.6 The federal regulator is defending these markets against state authorities, so product approval and jurisdiction are being settled at the same time.
The CFTC has also announced an industry roundtable on December 15 on whether derivatives markets could move to 24/7 trading.7 Nasdaq says the industry's move to a 23-hour trading day is expected on Sunday, December 6, 2026. That depends on the readiness of the SIP, the consolidated feed of US stock prices, and on SEC rule changes. Subject to SEC approval, Nasdaq will add a 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. ET session.8 The roundtable comes nine days after that expected date, so the debate over whether markets should run around the clock continues while some venues prepare to extend their hours.
For a European investor, a US session running from 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. Eastern would overlap with European trading hours. The dossier does not say how that would affect European brokers or exchanges, so we leave it there.
The Brazil test
The Brazilian presidential runoff on October 25 shows what these markets can and cannot do. Prediction markets expected Bolsonaro to win, and he lost. Brazilian firms then bought stablecoins to hedge currency risk, with USDT volume on Mercado Bitcoin up nearly 800% and Bitcoin volume up 865%.9 A prediction market called the result wrongly, and the practical effect came through the stablecoin channel. Kalshi, one of the venues in this story, counts Sequoia Capital among its investors.10 That is the only funding fact the dossier gives us about it.
The AI-finance side: trust before speed
The same dossier tracks a second theme. Agentic payments and fraud prevention are drawing capital, and the people funding it are cautious about AI doing the arithmetic.
Baselayer raised $35 million in a Series A led by M13, with participation from Picus Capital. The company, which helps financial institutions verify businesses and assess fraud risk, is extending its identity technology to AI agents.11 Its executive Jonathan Awad frames the problem as trust: "Agents spin up and they spin down. How can you trust this random one-task agent?"11 He also warns that unless agents can show they act for legitimate people or businesses, "agents will just get blocked everywhere."11 He says relationships with financial institutions typically take 12 to 18 months to establish, and large merchant partnerships up to 24 months.11 The dossier names no regulator in connection with these agent-identity products.
Norwest's Sean Jacobsohn is more cautious about AI in finance work: "You don't want AI doing calculations because it is not good at math. There are certain workflows it can handle where it doesn't produce precise numbers. But when you need precision, accuracy and calculations, you can't rely on AI for that."12 He says finance software may be easier to replace when the CFO is the direct buyer, and he sees a potential opportunity to disrupt NetSuite and Sage, starting downmarket.12 The dossier mentions Schwab's launch of its own assistant only in the narrative summary, with no figures or sources, so we do not analyse it.
The Crunchbase pieces carry a measured reliability of 49% of 41 checked claims holding up.11 The quotes are verbatim, but weigh the surrounding claims accordingly.
Where sources disagree
Sources diverge slightly on Robinhood's cash at September 30, 2025. One record shows $4.331 billion and another $4.3 billion.2 The difference looks like rounding, and we use the SEC-filing figure of $4.331 billion.2 Robinhood's cash stood at $5.362 billion in the second quarter of 2026, up from $4.162 billion a year earlier.2
What to watch
- October's KPI contracts: whether regulators approve the Cboe-Robinhood contracts tied to 23 companies.5
- Dec 6 and Dec 15: Nasdaq's expected 23-hour day, which needs SEC rule changes and SIP readiness, and the CFTC's 24/7 derivatives roundtable.7,8
- The Utah case: the outcome of the CFTC's suit against Utah and its proceedings against nine other states.6
- Robinhood's mix: whether event-contract revenue stays above crypto revenue after $173 million versus $120 million in Q3.1
- MiCA: whether other platforms follow Coinbase in dropping non-compliant stablecoins for EU users.3
Our broader view is that the stories linked here are one question seen from different sides. Markets are extending into more hours and more kinds of bet, while the rules on authority and trust are still being written. That is a reading of the data, not a finding from any single source.
