Telecommunications firms Verizon and SBC Communications, which are preparing to launch Internet-based video services, argued for looser regulations for such expanded services at a hearing Wednesday before the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications -- "The FCC and Congress have so far employed a light-touch approach to regulating the Internet and IP-based services," testified SBC senior executive vice president Lee Ann Champion. "We are not building a cable network, nor do we have any interest in being a cable company offering traditional cable service. Instead, we intend to offer customers a new total communications experience." Later this year, Verizon plans to launch an Internet-based TV service called FiOS TV, which it hopes to offer to 3 million homes by the end of the year. It has already signed up NBC Universal and Starz to provide content for the service. SBC has invested $4 billion in its Project Lightspeed, which aims to deploy services including IPTV to 18 million households in 13 states within three years. The hearing on new technologies was scheduled as Congress examines new legislation that would update the Telecommunications Act of 1996 to account for new technologies.
Prediction markets have stopped behaving like a betting curiosity and started behaving like market infrastructure. Executives who still file them under gambling are working from a stale map, and so are many of the regulators trying to govern them. A new Juniper Research market study gives prediction markets substantial attention, and its core message for decision-makers is that legitimacy, not demand, is now the binding constraint. Volume Has Outrun the Rulebook Juniper Research reports that combined monthly volume across Kalshi and Polymarket stood below $5 billion in September 2025 and reached roughly $24 billion by April 2026. Around the FIFA World Cup, a single month surpassed $50 billion, roughly matching the entire regulated U.S. sports betting handle for 2025. That is close to a tenfold climb in under a year, and it happened in full public view. Institutional Capital Has Taken a Position Intercontinental Exchange, parent of the New York Stock Exchange, committed $1 billion to Po...