Election washing machine. The first rule of fake club is to avoid being spotted. And the second is to try to respect the first at all costs. A course of action visibly left aside by fans of election betting on the Polymarket platform. Or should we rather talk about manipulators? Because two recent separate investigations warn about risks of intensive Wash Trading on the result presidential elections in the United States. But then, Donald Trump is not going to be elected with a score of 65 % ?
Donald Trump: elected (only) on Polymarket?
The presidential elections have dominated the news since cryptocurrencies have officially become a campaign topic. And the surveys follow one another, in order to try to estimate the proportion of American voters decided to vote crypto at all costs (including Bitcoin).
An already complicated exercise, to which is added the unprecedented growth of predictive market platforms. Systems of election betting whose objective is to try to anticipate the result of the election in order to pocket the associated benefits.
And like Donald Trump breaks all records on Polymarket, his fervent supporter Elon Musk quickly came to extol its merits in terms of polling. It must be said that with a score of 65% – against a second position at 48% in the official polls – the temptation was great. On the other hand, we will come back to the question of credibility…
Is it necessary to specify to what extent this gap of 17 points East simply improbable. And what about 30 points difference with Kamala Harris. Polymarket’s official statements, following the Fortune media article, will have difficulty convincing.
“Polymarket’s terms of use expressly prohibit market manipulation. We strive to provide users with the fairest analysis possible and our transparency allows the market to decide”
Polymarket
Inflated voting intentions for Wash Trading?
Doubts were already clearly allowed. But these are now two separate investigations – led by Chaos Labs and Inca Digital – which come to power this high frequency manipulation theory.
As reported by Fortune media, these two companies claim that the actual trading volume on the position Winner of the 2024 presidential election reached only $1.75 billionagainst the 2.77 billion dollars displayed. A gaping $1 billion chasm which leaves you perplexed!
Chaos Labs explains this situation due to the taking into account open positions up to $1 by the platform Polymarket. While they represent, for example, $0.34 for a Yes on Kamala Harris and $0.66 for Donald Trump. But other problems also exist elsewhere
“To conduct its analysis, Chaos Labs examined on-chain data to isolate high-volume traders (…). It then separated users who showed signs of wash trading, looking at their ratio of buy and sell orders and considering their stock holdings relative to their trading volume. Chaos Labs concluded that approximately one-third of the trading volume on the Presidential Market was likely related to wash trading.
Fortune
An activity of Wash Trading possibly accelerated following the recent announcement of launch of a native cryptocurrency on the Polymarket platform. Car one airdrop is also on the program. And the rewards paid are most of the time depending on the activity carried out by the users concerned. In any case, the question of whether the results of Polymarket are worthy of a survey recede to the rhythm of the unlikely rise you score they Donald Trump.
