Four different accounts have pumped $30 million into the betting site Polymarket, swaying the site’s prediction in favor of a Trump victory. The two candidates have been neck and neck since Harris entered the race in August, but Trump pulled ahead with a commanding lead in October. News that someone or someones have dumped tens of millions of dollars into the market and swayed the odds is further proof that Polymarket, and other predictive betting sites, are easy to manipulate and not a reflection of reality.
As of this writing, Polymarket has Trump’s odds of victory at 60% and Harris’ at 40%. Who does Polymarket think will win the popular vote? Its odds have Harris at 66% and Trump at just 34%. Trump’s lead on Polymarket was weird. The site fluctuates daily, but has often kept in line with national polling which shows the election is a toss-up.
The Wall Street Journal may have found the answer. Over the last few weeks, four new accounts on Polymarket have dumped $30 million onto the site. That amount of cash has swung Polymarket’s odds in Trump’s favor. Worse, Arkham Intelligence—a blockchain analysis group whose stated goal is to make crypto less anonymous—told the Journal that the four accounts are probably all the same person.
Who would dump $30 million onto Polymarket to swing the odds in Trump’s favor? It’s a mystery that may never have an answer. It could be a person looking for an enormous payday if Trump wins or, possibly, someone trying to create pro-Trump buzz on social media.
On October 6, as the cash started to hit Polymarket and Trump started to pull ahead of Harris, Elon Musk tweeted about it. “Trump now leading Kamala by 3% in betting markets. More accurate than polls, as actual money is on the line,” he said in a post on X.
The crypto-backed betting site Polymarket repeatedly bills itself as the future of news. But the site is not an indicator of reality. It’s a reflection of what degenerate gamblers are willing to wager on a coin flip.
The simple truth is that nothing can decisively predict a U.S. election. We worry over polls, watch the betting markets, and dissect every media appearance in hopes of divining some proof that the future is certain. But the future is never certain. Polls are a recent invention that, despite claims to the contrary, are no more accurate now than they were 100 years ago. Betting markets are just a new kind of prognostication that some will cling to for comfort. But stare too deeply and you’ll get lost in the hype. You may even lose money.
Better to just accept the mystery.
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