Polymarket paid mostly college-age creators to stage fake winning bets on copycat versions of its website. A Wall Street Journal investigation found none of the roughly $1.9 million in bets shown across 1,105 videos were real.
The findings run counter to the company’s core pitch. Polymarket settles every real trade on a public blockchain that anyone can audit. Its growth campaign relied on the opposite, staged trades on fake sites that no ledger could verify.
How Polymarket’s Alleged Fake Bets Worked
Real Polymarket trades run on the Polygon blockchain and settle in USDC. Markets resolve through UMA’s permissionless oracle, where anyone can propose or dispute an outcome by posting a $750 bond. Every position is public.
The marketing operation lived entirely off that ledger. The Journal reportedly reviewed 1,105 videos from 10 promoted creators between December and mid-May. Around 70% showed a bet, and none were genuine.
One video showed a creator winning $100,000 after Trump appeared to say the word McDonald’s in January. Trump never said it publicly that month, and the clip was older.
On the real market, public data shows more than 50 accounts made that bet, and all lost.
Many clips were filmed on dummy sites such as poiymarket.com, built to mirror the real platform. Across 118 videos, creators celebrated roughly $900,000 in fabricated wins. The same bets would have lost more than $166,000.
Creators earned about $2,000 to $3,000 a month and were told not to disclose the payments. A hired marketing firm then pushed the clips past 140 million views. The pattern echoes an earlier market resolution dispute that dented user trust.
Scandal Hits During Polymarket’s US Comeback
The timing is awkward. US regulators fined Polymarket $1.4 million in 2022 for running an unregistered market and ordered the winding down of non-compliant trades.
The company later reincorporated in Panama, with its headquarters reportedly a shared law office that also worked with FTX.
Polymarket has since won a regulated US market entry and now wants to bring its exchange onshore.
The fake campaign specifically targeted American users, who can still reach the offshore site through a VPN.
Trust questions are not new. A separate Journal analysis found most users lose money, even as the videos sold easy profit.
Now competing with regulated rival Kalshi, Polymarket said it will audit its promotional content.
That review, which is changing how regulators view its onshore push, may shape the next phase of the prediction market race.
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