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Risk disclosure

Market prices are what the market pays; AI estimates are assessments of evidence, not facts about the world. Real-money access is preparing to launch on the conditions below: each market switches on only after its legal review and deployment checks pass, and funded trading in a given market stays closed until that point. No operating authorization or approved venue arrangement has been verified for this product, and naming an operating entity records a fact, not a legal conclusion. Counsel review of the actual binary claims, operator roles and jurisdictions is part of each market's launch check.

The terms and disclosures collect the specific statements a customer would have to accept, and the listing policy says which hypotheses this site will and will not list.

This is not legal advice. This page summarizes the product's risk posture. Nothing here should be relied on for any decision. Obtain jurisdiction-specific advice from qualified counsel before handling real funds.
1. What this isPreparing for funded launch; no registration exists.

Science Markets is operated by The Science Markets operator. Each market's funded trading switches on through its own launch checks, and no regulatory approval is claimed anywhere on this site. The Solana and Raydium code is the implementation the product deploys; deployment status is shown on each market page, not claimed here. The AI estimate is produced by three models reading a prepared packet, and it is a reading of that packet, not a report about the world.

When real capital is live, the following will still be true unless a regulator says otherwise, and the product discloses it up front rather than burying it:

  • Science Markets is not a registered exchange or clearinghouse. No designated contract market, derivatives clearing organization, swap execution facility, or broker registration exists, and none is implied by anything on this site.
  • No CFTC or SEC approval covers this product. Nothing here is CFTC-approved, SEC-approved, or approved by any state regulator, and no scientific probability shown here carries a regulator's endorsement.
  • Nothing here is a license, a permit, or an anticipated license. We do not publish a pending application as though it were granted, and a partner's registration does not belong to Science Markets and is not ours to describe as ours.
  • No promise of indefinite operation. A market is designed to run without a scheduled expiry. That is not a guarantee that the platform, the collateral issuer, the model providers, or the resolution process will keep running.
Read the two companion pages. The terms and disclosures set out the specific statements a real customer would have to accept before a position, and the listing and admission policy says which hypotheses can be listed at all and which are excluded.
2. The classification question is unsettledThe exact contract and operating roles need jurisdiction-specific review.

The CFTC's 2022 Polymarket order treated that operator's paired binary event contracts as swaps despite blockchain implementation. It is a relevant warning, not a ruling on this exact scientific product. Full collateralization, scientific subject matter and noncustodial wallets do not establish an exemption.

The transferable claims require contract-specific derivatives, securities, gambling, payments and consumer-law analysis. US operation and US customer access are separate questions: production website access from US IPs is blocked, including read-only pages, by the controls described in the terms. A foreign user, a website blocklist or a partner's license does not authorize the operator's actual activities. No launch jurisdiction has been established here, and a sports-market ruling cannot decide this product's status.

3. How this differs from a sports marketSettles on a reading of the literature; losses capped at what you paid.

Sports-market litigation does not decide the status of scientific claims. The Science Markets design has differences counsel must examine:

QuestionSports event contractThis product
When it resolvesAt the final whistle, on a fixed dateWhen three designated models agree on a verdict. A market may never get there.
What it resolves onThe game resultA verdict reached against frozen criteria, from a published evidence packet
LeverageVariesNone: every token is fully collateralized
Maximum lossDepends on the contract and funding rulesThe committed purchase amount and applicable costs

These are arguments, not conclusions. A regulator could reasonably call a binary position on a contested scientific claim a bet, and the “substantial similarity” analysis that governs preemption questions is fact-specific. Anyone telling you this structure automatically escapes gambling or derivatives law is guessing.

4. Other regimes that would applySecurities, money transmission, sanctions, consumer, data, cross-border.
  • Securities law. If positions or any associated token were marketed as an investment with expected profit from a promoter's efforts, securities analysis would apply. This design uses transferable YES/NO outcome tokens and does not promise a return. Marketing and the actual deployment both affect the analysis.
  • Money transmission and custody. Holding customer funds, even in a non-custodial design, raises money-transmitter and safeguarding questions that vary by state and country.
  • Sanctions and KYC/AML. A real venue would need screening, a blocking-sanctions program, and a customer-identification regime. A pseudonymous wallet does not remove these obligations.
  • Consumer protection. Disclosure, complaint handling, and suitability rules still apply, and “the user could see the number” is not a disclosure program.
  • Data, IP, and publishing rights. Ingesting papers and news into a packet the models read raises licensing and database-right questions, and processing personal data raises privacy obligations.
  • Transferable tokens and pools. Website eligibility controls do not restrict direct program calls, ordinary transferable-token transfers, independent pools or Raydium swaps through other interfaces. Gating mint or redemption alone cannot prevent acquiring exposure elsewhere, which is why access enforcement, wallet screening and the restricted-country list stay under continuous review. Required transaction-path restrictions and lawful exits are settled per market before its funded pools open.
5. Risks specific to this mechanismOracle, manipulation, capital, model, code, validity.
  • The oracle is the operator. A signed report proves who submitted it, not that the assessment is honest, well-sourced, or calibrated. The operator also chooses what evidence the models read, which is the most valuable point of attack.
  • The estimate can be influenced. Coordinated publication, prompt injection aimed at the retrieval pipeline, or a fabricated source could move a round. Mitigations are process controls, not proofs.
  • Capital duration risk. A complete YES + NO pair locks 1 USDC. Collateral can remain locked for a long time if resolution never becomes final. Selling before resolution depends on pool liquidity, not a guaranteed weekly exit.
  • Model, provider, and methodology risk. Providers change models without notice. A round produced under a different model version is not the same instrument, and upgrade policy has to be committed at entry rather than decided later.
  • Wallet-only does not mean trustless. Users would still depend on the oracle operator's evidence and signed reports, model providers, any program upgrade authority, Raydium execution and USDC's issuer, including freeze and depeg risk. Terminal-mode unanimous YES/NO settlement has no settlement appeal once a market's terminal binding activates, and each activation passes its own legal review. Existing markets without a terminal binding keep the policy they listed with. Agreement can be wrong.
  • Code risk. The payout arithmetic is tested, but an on-chain implementation carries smart-contract, upgrade-authority, and token-program risks that no test suite can rule out.
  • Scientific validity is not the same as profit. Traders price the pools independently of weekly AI guidance. Model agreement does not prove scientific truth, and you can be right about the science and still lose money.
6. What is not promisedNo yield, no accuracy, no promise of continued operation.
  • Returns, yield and profit are not promised.
  • Nothing here asserts the panel is accurate. It is an AI estimate, not truth.
  • No guarantee of continued operation, liquidity, or an available exit quote.
  • Transferable YES/NO tokens and Raydium pools are the trading design, not evidence that a particular market is deployed, liquid or open to you.
7. What happens before a market takes real capitalSix preconditions per market, from advice to wind-down.
  1. Jurisdiction-specific advice on derivatives, gambling, and securities classification.
  2. A licensing decision on exchange, dealer, or money-transmission activity, and custody.
  3. A sanctions, KYC, and AML program with an audit trail.
  4. Independent review of the contracts and the payout arithmetic, on-chain if applicable.
  5. A committed loss budget and a documented shutdown and wind-down path.
  6. Written disclosure of the oracle, the evidence process, and the failure and upgrade rules.
8. SourcesThe primary public materials behind section 2.

Kalshi uses identified members and exchange-defined settlement sources, not a wallet-only AI oracle. Polymarket's global wallet platform, its US exchange/clearing entities and its US app have separate terms and privacy scopes. Neither company's controls or registrations transfer to Science Markets. Learn from clear rules and pre-signature fees, not copied country lists, identity claims or legal boilerplate.

Official sources accessed 14 October 2026. Policies and registrations can change.

Questions or corrections on this page are welcome. It accumulates rulings as they come down, and it will be out of date the moment a court or regulator speaks again.
On this page
1. What this is 2. The classification question 3. How this differs from sports 4. Other regimes 5. Mechanism risks 6. What is not promised 7. Before real capital 8. Sources
Terms & disclosures → Listing & admission policy →
Funded trading is preparing to launch, market by market. Nothing here is investment, legal, or scientific advice, and no regulator has approved this product.