Japan's communications ministry is studying mandatory age-verification filters for social platforms, with legislation possible by year-end. The move follows similar steps by Australia, UK, Indonesia, and others.
An Argentine judge ordered a nationwide block on Polymarket after unusually large, precise bets appeared on inflation data 15 minutes before official release, prompting insider trading suspicions. Regulators cite lack of KYC, unlicensed operation, and crypto payments.
India's MeitY issued an ISP-level block against Polymarket under new online gaming rules, classifying it as illegal money gaming. Kalshi may face similar action by May 23. Regulators also met with Binance, WazirX, and ZebPay this week.
A Buenos Aires court ruled Polymarket is an unlicensed betting platform, ordering ENACOM to block access and Apple/Google to remove its app. The case cited inflation prediction activity and risks of underage access.
France’s national gambling regulator has ordered all domestic internet service providers to block access to Polymarket, escalating a four-year standoff with the crypto-based prediction platform. The order, formally issued on July 16, treats Polymarket as illegal gambling rather than an unlicensed crypto exchange, a distinction that could shape how other European regulators proceed. French authorities said an earlier restriction introduced in November 2024, which barred domestic users from sending funds to the platform, failed to curb activity. Citing Similarweb data, the regulator said Polymarket drew 205,057 unique visitors in France and 578,751 total visits in June 2026 alone, with VPN use allowing users to bypass payment restrictions. Authorities also pointed to two enforcement tracks: a complaint from Météo-France over alleged manipulation of temperature sensor data tied to weather contracts on Polymarket, and a review of a French trader using the account name “Fredi9999,” who was said to have shifted odds in 2024 U.S. election markets through large positions. With more than 30 countries and territories already restricting Polymarket, France’s decision may become a reference point for the European Union as it weighs whether crypto prediction markets belong under gambling law or financial-market rules such as MiCA.
Buying clinical-stage weight-loss drugs has emerged as an unexpected crypto payments use case, according to a July 20 Bloomberg report cited by Foresight News. The report says the market, much of it tied to peptides sold as research chemicals, is running at a pace that would top $100 million a year. Many of the buyers are not crypto natives but ordinary consumers who learned how to buy and send Bitcoin only because sellers would not accept cards or bank transfers. Bloomberg described one such buyer, Zach, a 49-year-old marketing director in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, who opened a Coinbase account and bought Bitcoin for the first time to purchase 20 vials of retatrutide from a Chinese seller for $240. He had previously viewed Bitcoin as a speculative asset with no intrinsic value, but the price gap versus U.S. resellers made the transaction worth the risk in his view. Chainalysis said gray-market peptide sellers took in $32 million in crypto in the first quarter of 2026, up 700% year over year, while TRM Labs estimated $41.4 million of crypto inflows in 2025, up 20%. The report also notes that if U.S. regulators move to legalize domestic production of some peptides, the role crypto fills in this market could shrink.
France’s gambling regulator has moved from limiting transactions to blocking access to Polymarket’s website, arguing that a trading-only geo-restriction did not stop the platform from reaching a large French audience. On July 17, the Autorité Nationale des Jeux, or ANJ, said internet service providers should block the site after Similarweb data showed 578,751 visits and 205,057 unique visitors from France in June 2026. The regulator said the homepage continued to display live odds and promote what it views as unauthorized gambling services, even after earlier controls were put in place to prevent financial transactions from France. The case highlights a core distinction in crypto prediction markets: settlement may happen onchain, but most retail users still rely on websites, APIs, order-routing systems and operator-controlled access points to discover markets and place trades. ANJ’s action targets that service and distribution layer rather than Polymarket’s Polygon-based settlement contracts. The move also fits a broader European pattern in which national regulators, rather than an EU-wide ban, are taking separate actions against prediction market platforms on gambling-law grounds.
France’s national gambling regulator, Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ), ordered internet service providers on July 16 to block prediction market platform Polymarket across the country. According to CoinDesk, the move escalates earlier French action taken in November 2024, when authorities had already imposed a financial transaction ban on the platform. The latest order pushes enforcement to the network level, with violations carrying fines of up to €100,000, or about $114,000. ANJ argued that the live odds displayed on Polymarket’s homepage amount to the distribution and promotion of gambling services, which conflicts with France’s classification of prediction markets as illegal gambling. That classification formally took effect in February 2026. The regulator also cited product design concerns, saying the platform lacks betting limits, does not offer self-exclusion tools, and includes addictive features. The tougher approach follows limited results from the earlier ban. In June 2026, Polymarket still recorded 578,751 visits from France, coming from 205,057 unique users. The report also said other European countries, including Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Romania, Hungary, Switzerland, Belgium, and Poland, have already moved to restrict or block the platform.
