Technology luminary Elon Musk recently sparked a lot of interest in decentralized prediction market Polymarket after the billionaire said the site could predict the results of the 2024 US presidential election more accurately than traditional polls.
Musk wrote a post about this on the social media platform X, which he currently owns. In recent months, the billionaire has increasingly thrown his support behind US presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump.
Recently, Musk gave a speech supporting Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Betting on Polymarket
According to Polymarket, at the time of Musk’s post on October 6, Trump was leading Democratic candidate Kamala Harris by about three percentage points.
Elon Musk claims in a social media post that Polymarket is more accurate at forecasting than traditional surveys. Source: Elon Musk
“Trump now leads Kamala in betting markets by 3%. More accurate than polls as there is actual money at stake.”
Polymarket is a decentralized prediction market that allows users to bet on the outcome of an event.
As Cointelegraph recently reported, the US presidential election was the most active event in the site’s history. Some analysts have even described the growing popularity of prediction markets as a public good.
At this point, it is unclear how “accurately” Polymarket will predict the 2024 US presidential election.
While Musk and some analysts believe that predictions where money plays a role incentivizes a more accurate market, one can also argue that predicting a financial winner does not necessarily indicate a person’s political beliefs.
For example, a person might vote for one candidate even though he or she predicts or even bets that the opposing candidate will ultimately win.
Related to the identity of Bitcoin (BTC) creator Satoshi Nakamoto, activity on Polymarket appears to have reached a fever pitch ahead of HBO’s identity reveal on October 8th.
The current total is almost $400,000, with the late American computer scientist Len Sassaman leading by a wide margin.
