Polymarket Accused of Paying Creators to Film Fake Betting Videos

Odaily Odaily Planet Daily News Polymarket, a crypto prediction market platform, has been accused of paying dozens of creators, mostly of college age, to film betting videos on pages closely resembling its website, with some videos also showing fabricated profits. A review of 1,105 videos posted by 10 creators since December found that approximately 70% contained betting content, and the roughly $1.9 million in wagers displayed were not real transactions.  

One video released in January showed college student George Makihara celebrating a $100,000 win from betting that Donald Trump would say "McDonald’s" that month. However, the footage was reportedly filmed two months early; Trump did not publicly utter the word in January of that year, and over 50 real accounts betting on the same event on Polymarket all incurred losses. Some creators entered trades on test pages, including the misspelled domain "poiymarket.com," which were allegedly built by Polymarket or used for engineering test environments.  

In 118 videos, creators displayed nearly $900,000 in fictitious gains, while these bets would have resulted in losses of over $166,000 based on actual outcomes. Creators received approximately $2,000 to $3,000 per month and were instructed not to disclose the collaboration arrangement. Polymarket stated it is committed to maintaining accurate, fair, and transparent markets and plans to conduct a comprehensive audit of promotional content. (Decrypt)