BETTING PLATFORM POLYMARKET HAS BECOME POPULAR ON EVE OF U.S. ELECTIONS LARGE AMOUNTS ARE BEING PUT IN BETTING SITES ON PREDICTING POLITICAL EVENTS

Recently, cryptocurrency entrepreneur and investor Balaji S Srinivasan posted a small cryptic message about the US presidential election on X (formerly Twitter). He wrote “Polymarket is the news,” and shared a screenshot of the prediction betting website, where the chances of Joe Biden winning the election was shown to be 25% while his chances of losing was 70%.

Polymarket made the headlines a few days back when people betted on Biden’s chances of dropping out of the election at as high as 80%. Currently, punters on Polymarket have placed bets of $25.74 million on 42% chances of Joe Biden staying in the race while, $7.24 million on vice-president Kamala Harris’s 40% chances of replacing Biden as Democrat candidate, and $11.09 million on Michelle Obama’s 7% chances of being the
Democratic Party presidential candidate. Due to intensified betting activities fuelled by the US presidential election, the monthly revenue of Polymarket crossed $ 100 million for the first time in June.

Founded in 2020, Polymarket is a crypto betting platform that offers betting opportunities on political events and outcomes such as elections and results. Polymarket betting became an important indicator of US citizen’s true mood at a time when newspapers and TV channels are accused of being bought-out by political parties. In the same X thread, Balaji says, “You can now short the Party with cryptocurrency. Take any NYT headline, figure out how Sulzberger’s employees are lying this time, and turn it into a prediction
market. Once the Party is forced to accept reality, collect your money. Rinse and repeat.”

Balaji is an influential cryptocurrency thinker, early bitcoin adopter, and prolific investor. He was tipped to be taken into the Donald Trump administration last time but for some reason he failed to make it. If Donald Trump, who has promised his support for the cryptocurrency sector and has received substantial donations from crypto firms in his current campaign for the White House, wins, Balaji could well be a part of the US administration this time.

Balaji has been criticizing the way the US economy and its finances have been managed by the Federal
Reserve under the Democrat governments. He says, “Anti-tech journalists hate tech. So, by talking to a media corporation, you harm the value of your equity, thereby harming yourself. You are literally giving them money at your own expense, by giving them $100 in clicks and giving up $100k in equity.”

Polymarket’s prediction on who will win the US presidential election 2024 has $230 million placed on Donald Trump having 61% chance of winning, Kamala Harris 15%, Joe Biden 12%, and Michelle Obama 5%. Polymarket offers interesting possibilities for prediction. For example, you can bet on “will china invade Taiwan in 2024. At 10% chances, punters have placed $1.2 million. Will Israel invade Lebanon before September? At 35% chances, punters have placed $116,800. in Pop culture, it offers prediction betting on topics as Elon (Musk) tweets and Taylor Swift will marry in 2024, Diddy arrested before August. Polymarket has received a new round of funding by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and co-founder of PayPal
and investor Peter Thiel.

Recently, Taiwan charged a man for betting on the Taiwan Presidential elections that concluded in January
this year. The Taiwanese laws make it illegal to bet on election results. During the election, Taiwan had blocked the Polymarket website and even launched a crackdown on illegal betting activities. The accused, Chen, had placed 472 USDC (worth $472) for Ko Wen- Je of the Taiwan People’s Party to win the presidential election. Chen had placed another 60 USDC on the Democratic Progressive Party winning more seats in the
legislature.