Hundreds Of Millions In Crypto Being Wagered On Polymarket

Forbes

Will Taylor Swift get engaged in 2024? Will JD Vance be replaced as veep nominee? Despite its questionable legality, hundreds of millions in crypto are being wagered on events like these on Polymarket.  Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/ninabambysheva/2024/07/31/meet-the-26-year-old-building-a-billion-dollar-prediction-marketplace/  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00Today on Forbes, meet the 26-year-old building a billion-dollar prediction marketplace.

00:08What are the chances that Vice President Kamala Harris will defeat former President Trump

00:11in November?

00:12On a blockchain-based website called PolyMarket, Harris' chances, according to the thousands

00:18betting, as of Thursday, are put at 44%, while Trump's are at 54%, with Michelle Obama and

00:26RFK Jr. at about 1%.

00:29Will J.D. Vance be replaced as Trump's VP nominee?

00:32A $100 bet will return $1,000 if Vance bows out.

00:38Welcome to the future of betting markets, where nearly anything can be wagered on, from

00:43Bitcoin's peak price in 2024, to the speed at which Trump and Biden climb stairs, to

00:48the sex of Haley and Justin Bieber's new baby.

00:52On PolyMarket, some $472 million is currently being wagered on the outcome of the presidential

00:58election in November.

01:00Never mind that in the United States, betting on the outcome of elections is prohibited,

01:04according to the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission, which deems it against the public

01:08interest.

01:09PolyMarket, whose headquarters is in New York City, is a prediction market phenom, thanks

01:15largely to the world's current obsession with American politics.

01:20Launched in 2020, PolyMarket has already surpassed $650 million in trading volume this year,

01:26with nearly $300 million in July alone, according to data from Dune Analytics.

01:33The platform is expected to process $1 billion in wagered predictions before the year is

01:37over.

01:39Campaign managers and political analysts now turn to this unconventional oracle, seeking

01:44clues in the fluctuating market prices.

01:47Even former President Donald Trump has touted his PolyMarket odds on his social media app,

01:52Truth Social.

01:54Though blockchain technology isn't necessary for this type of application, PolyMarket uses

01:59a network called Polygon, which operates 24-7 and sits atop Ethereum, where transactions

02:05cost fractions of the chain's normal fees.

02:08However, instead of U.S. dollars, customers who want to make trades on PolyMarket use

02:13the dollar-based stablecoin USDC.

02:16But even that is changing.

02:18Last week, PolyMarket announced it is enabling users to pay for their bets using bank transfers

02:23and credit cards through a partnership with Miami-based MoonPay.

02:28The prediction marketplace's soaring popularity has convinced top-tier investors, including

02:33Peter Thiel's Founders Fund and Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, to back the startup

02:38with funding totaling $74 million.

02:42Currently, markets tied to U.S. elections, of which there are more than 100, are driving

02:47most of the trading volume on PolyMarket.

02:50These are supposedly off-limits to U.S. residents, though 25% of the website's traffic comes

02:55from the U.S., according to web analytics platform SimilarWeb.

03:01PolyMarket's 26-year-old founder, Shane Coplin, won't say much about his team's efforts to

03:05prevent U.S.-based users from betting on elections.

03:08He prefers to emphasize his platform's strengths.

03:12From PolyMarket's posh penthouse office in New York City's SoHo neighborhood, Coplin

03:16says, quote,

03:17"...PolyMarket effectively takes what otherwise would be an internet yelling match and turns

03:22that into a market where the person who's right wins.

03:25We want our forecasts to become ubiquitous and mainstream."

03:30Raised in Manhattan by his NYU film professor mother, Coplin says he was an internet nerd.

03:36At age 14, he was experimenting with building a cryptocurrency mining rig, and in 2014,

03:41he participated in the Ethereum pre-sale, when the price of Ether was roughly 30 cents.

03:47Coplin studied computer science at NYU, but dropped out during his second semester in

03:512017.

03:53As the world plunged into uncertainty during the pandemic lockdown in 2020, Coplin began

03:58exploring PolyMarket's predecessors like Ethereum-based prediction market Augur, which never really

04:04gained traction.

04:05Eventually, he began developing his own prediction platform.

04:10PolyMarket's first event market was a small wager about when New York City would reopen.

04:15Coplin's seed funding of $4 million came a few months later, in October 2020, and was

04:20led by another crypto wunderkind, Olaf Karlsson Wee, founder of crypto hedge fund Polychain Capital.

04:28For full coverage, check out Nina Bambasheva's piece on Forbes.com.

04:34This is Kieran Meadows from Forbes.

04:36Thanks for tuning in.

04:40♪♪♪

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