Polymarket.com - Bets on any events (politics, sports, crypto markets, and more)

[dwyane36]

Polymarket was obviously originally conceived as a way for people to manually bet on events and in the price of Bitcoin in the short term, but lately there have been a lot of people who have been abusing bot and AI agents in order to try to get long term profitability in the 5 minute markets for Bitcoin and other alternative currencies.
There are a lot of bettors on Polymarket a who use bots, and also there are whales which abuse their holdings to turn the market to their favor, by opening or closing positions while they are getting on Polymarket.

This is not longer about entertainment, this has become a literal money printing machine for some people who have the required tools and capital.

Since Polymarket provides an extensive API, it would be strange if users didn't take advantage of it. In fact, thanks to the API and the resulting automation, every user can try to make money on prediction markets, especially in 5-minute markets. There's obviously no point in trading manually in those markets unless you're just looking to have a little fun.

[PauloKoner]

Since Polymarket provides an extensive API, it would be strange if users didn't take advantage of it. In fact, thanks to the API and the resulting automation, every user can try to make money on prediction markets, especially in 5-minute markets. There's obviously no point in trading manually in those markets unless you're just looking to have a little fun.

I haven't used Polymarket myself and only heard about FUN bets on events like the second coming.

After reading this topic I understand much better what kind of platform it is...

[Hispo]

Since Polymarket provides an extensive API, it would be strange if users didn't take advantage of it. In fact, thanks to the API and the resulting automation, every user can try to make money on prediction markets, especially in 5-minute markets. There's obviously no point in trading manually in those markets unless you're just looking to have a little fun.

I haven't used Polymarket myself and only heard about FUN bets on events like the second coming.

After reading this topic I understand much better what kind of platform it is...

Part of the attractiveness of Polymarket is how there are markets for anything: sports, culture, politics and also weird stuff which would be never offered by others.
One can bet on the United States annexing Venezuela, Canadá or Greenland. One can also bet on the word which could be said by Trump or Elon Musk on Twitter.
It is a very abundant market, the downside is how it can be easily manipulated by bettors with privileged information.
Trump and his family could easily make millions of dollars alone out of Polymarket if they wanted, there are people who assure Trump family is already doing it.

[batako]

It is marketed as a decentralized prediction website, but it is not. You get that clearly when you sign up and you are giving addresses generated for you. There is an option to export the private keys on this address but if you did not generate it yourself it is not your keys and if it is not, the platform is not decentralized.

The way your title is worded and also the way the OP begins, one would easily think this is an official ANN for polymarket. You can include there that it is an inquiry.

- Jay -

Creating new wallet isnt mandatory, its to give users a choice whether they will play with their own wallet or with the fresh one, thats why such option exist. You can still use your own wallet btw. And even when you play with your generated wallet during that sign up process, you will still be the only person who has access to it!

But yes, polymarket isnt fully decentralized due to at least 5 reasons

- Order matching
- They control which markets are listed
- Its website and APIs
- Market outcomes need external mechanisms
- Platform rules, they restricted some jurisdictions which is so centralized


Implementing Web3 isnt an easy task, mainly in the deeply entrenched Web2 era, where its so difficult to compete against the massive Web2 platforms that generate trillions of dollars.

Let alone those platforms, bitcointalk itself, who lives and talks cryptocurrency in daily basis, doesnt implement web3 still 

[IjawMan]

Part of the attractiveness of Polymarket is how there are markets for anything: sports, culture, politics and also weird stuff which would be never offered by others.

What I think about the polymarket is that they are overdoing it by adding sports activities into their betting features, that is an area they could have left exclusively for casinos and sportsbook gambling site.

To particularly be reminded that they claim not to be a gambling site makes the inclusion of sports activities for users to be able to bet on them more confusing about their position.

Culture, economy and politics issues should have just been their only focus. Imo.

[pawel7777]

https://www.reuters.com/business/polymarket-reports-major-outage-suspends-trading-actions-2026-10-29
https://decrypt.co/382185/polymarket-pauses-trading-prediction-market-security-incident

I haven't been frequent on Polymarket recently but apparently there was some "security incident" today, resulting in Polymarket temporarily halting trading as a precaution. They said everything is now fixed and affected traders have been reimbursed.
The incident was related to a 3rd party, DebugBear, that Polymarket uses to monitor performance. Hackers apparently managed to add wallet-draining code to the DebugBear-hosted script.

Turns out "decentralised" platforms aren't as safe as we thought.

[Hispo]

...

Culture, economy and politics issues should have just been their only focus. Imo.

Right, but the administration of Polymarket is not stupid. They are very aware of the huge volume the sport betting market has on other bookies and casinos, they naturally wanted to get their slice of the huge pie of the sportbetting market.

If they only offered culture, politics and other non-conventional markets, then they would not get as much money as they do today.
Though, they have also gotten into trouble because they don't have a gambling license, while at the same time offering those markets. That is why they are getting so many lawsuits in the USA...

[AlexSnowSnow]

...

Culture, economy and politics issues should have just been their only focus. Imo.

Right, but the administration of Polymarket is not stupid. They are very aware of the huge volume the sport betting market has on other bookies and casinos, they naturally wanted to get their slice of the huge pie of the sportbetting market.

If they only offered culture, politics and other non-conventional markets, then they would not get as much money as they do today.
Though, they have also gotten into trouble because they don't have a gambling license, while at the same time offering those markets. That is why they are getting so many lawsuits in the USA...

Yes I literally came across info about this the other day: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7627041/2026/09/24/polymarket-new-york-lawsuit-prediction-market-sports-gambling/
It's interesting how they'll deal with these accusations since I doubt they'll agree to restructure.

[Hispo]

...

Yes I literally came across info about this the other day: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7627041/2026/09/24/polymarket-new-york-lawsuit-prediction-market-sports-gambling/
It's interesting how they'll deal with these accusations since I doubt they'll agree to restructure.

I assume they are expecting Trump Administration to help them out against those lawsuits, I guess.
We all already know Trump and his family are very in favor of gambling, betting and prediction markets, so the could use the federal government in order to rescue Polymarket eventually. However, States of the USA are supposed to have some autonomy as well.

Some people believe Polymarket as become too big to fail as this point, but I think if enough States manage to successfully sue Polymarket, it could bring to its end in the United States.

[notblox1]

Turns out "decentralised" platforms aren't as safe as we thought.

Polymarket was never fully decentralized, it was more hybrid platform with centralized control.
I dont think it is realistic to create functional fully decentralized gambling platform without sacrificing something.
There was cases that even decentralized platforms had bugs and exploits, so there is nothing ideal.

[JeromeTash]

Turns out "decentralised" platforms aren't as safe as we thought.

No one said they ever were. Even a decentralised exchange like bisq was exploited at one point. Being open source or decentralised does not mean that the platform is bullet proof. No system is immune to exploitable bugs. What decentralisation tries to eliminate is that middle man who may try to freeze or control your funds at one point.

[Saint-loup]

It is marketed as a decentralized prediction website, but it is not. You get that clearly when you sign up and you are giving addresses generated for you. There is an option to export the private keys on this address but if you did not generate it yourself it is not your keys and if it is not, the platform is not decentralized.

The way your title is worded and also the way the OP begins, one would easily think this is an official ANN for polymarket. You can include there that it is an inquiry.

- Jay -

Creating new wallet isnt mandatory, its to give users a choice whether they will play with their own wallet or with the fresh one, thats why such option exist. You can still use your own wallet btw. And even when you play with your generated wallet during that sign up process, you will still be the only person who has access to it!

But yes, polymarket isnt fully decentralized due to at least 5 reasons

- Order matching
- They control which markets are listed
- Its website and APIs
- Market outcomes need external mechanisms
- Platform rules, they restricted some jurisdictions which is so centralized


Implementing Web3 isnt an easy task, mainly in the deeply entrenched Web2 era, where its so difficult to compete against the massive Web2 platforms that generate trillions of dollars.

Let alone those platforms, bitcointalk itself, who lives and talks cryptocurrency in daily basis, doesnt implement web3 still  

Are you sure there is a way to avoid making deposits for trading there? Is this way available or still open at least to anyone? Because AFAIK currently even if you are registered and logged through a web3 wallet you still need to make deposits to a Polymarket address and to make withdrawals from the platform to get your funds. I don't know why because you still need to often confirm your actions with your web3 wallet but personally that is how I have to do.

Each Polymarket account is assigned a fixed crypto deposit address tied to the specific profile. This address cannot be changed or regenerated manually. Deposit addresses are unique to the blockchain network, so your address on Solana or Bitcoin may differ from your Polygon/EVM address.

https://help.polymarket.com/en/articles/13369887-how-to-deposit

[IjawMan]

...

Culture, economy and politics issues should have just been their only focus. Imo.

Right, but the administration of Polymarket is not stupid. They are very aware of the huge volume the sport betting market has on other bookies and casinos, they naturally wanted to get their slice of the huge pie of the sportbetting market.

If they only offered culture, politics and other non-conventional markets, then they would not get as much money as they do today.
Though, they have also gotten into trouble because they don't have a gambling license, while at the same time offering those markets. That is why they are getting so many lawsuits in the USA...

They might not be stupid on one end but on another end I take it that they are if they will be  making bets for sports and then be denouncing itself from been called a gambling site. To me, they are with a gambling image whether a legal suit or not, as long as they have sports betting included in their service.

There are gambling sites that only offers sportsbook and they are known as gambling platforms. Why will that of polymarket be of any different if they have sports betting as one of their many services.

[Odusko]

...

Culture, economy and politics issues should have just been their only focus. Imo.

Right, but the administration of Polymarket is not stupid. They are very aware of the huge volume the sport betting market has on other bookies and casinos, they naturally wanted to get their slice of the huge pie of the sportbetting market.

If they only offered culture, politics and other non-conventional markets, then they would not get as much money as they do today.
Though, they have also gotten into trouble because they don't have a gambling license, while at the same time offering those markets. That is why they are getting so many lawsuits in the USA...

They might not be stupid on one end but on another end I take it that they are if they will be  making bets for sports and then be denouncing itself from been called a gambling site. To me, they are with a gambling image whether a legal suit or not, as long as they have sports betting included in their service.

There are gambling sites that only offers sportsbook and they are known as gambling platforms. Why will that of polymarket be of any different if they have sports betting as one of their many services.

Predicted market is a combination of both gambling and trading, and in fact anyone can decide to run both on one platform just as we have some casinos with predictions market here on Bitcointalk talk, what make predictions market more regulated is because of their ability to trade on some commodities which align them with stock market so for that reason sex will have to properly license and regulate them, this is where predictions marketa run into problem with regulations and compliance sometimes and where we can draw a conclusion that predictions market like polymarket and the rest have different structures from the traditional crypto gambling sites.

[Hispo]

I have been checking out a lot of Republicans on Twitter who thought this American midterm election was going to be a piece of cake for Trump and his candidates for the house of representatives and the Senate. Many people angry, not only because Democrats managed to get a huge win in the country, but also because several of them lost money on Polymarket. 

What about you guys?
Did you manage to pocket some money thanks to this election and the blue wave which spoiled Trumps plans?

I personally stayed away from this election because there was just so much uncertainty whether Democrats were going to be able to claim both the Senate and the house.