Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump are neck and neck in the polls. But in one popular betting market, the odds have skewed heavily in Trump’s favor, raising questions about a recent flurry of wagers and who is behind them.
Over the past two weeks, the chances of a Trump victory in the November election have surged on Polymarket, a crypto-based prediction market. Its bettors were giving Trump a 62% chance of winning on Thursday, while Harris’s chances were 38%. The candidates were in a dead heat at the start of October.
Trump’s gains on Polymarket have cheered his supporters, and they have been followed by the odds shifting in Trump’s favor in other betting markets. Elon Musk flagged Trump’s growing lead on Polymarket to his 200 million X followers on Oct. 6, praising the concept of betting markets. “More accurate than polls, as actual money is on the line,” Musk posted.
But the surge might be a mirage manufactured by a group of four Polymarket accounts that have collectively pumped about $30 million of crypto into bets that Trump will win.
“There’s strong reason to believe they are the same entity,” said Miguel Morel, chief executive of Arkham Intelligence, a blockchain analysis firm that examined the accounts….
The accounts betting big on Trump—Fredi9999, Theo4, PrincessCaro and Michie—were all funded by deposits from Kraken, a U.S.-based crypto exchange, according to Arkham. They behave in a similar fashion, systematically placing frequent bets on Trump and stepping up the size of their bets at the same time, Arkham found. The oldest of the accounts was created in June, while the newest was created this month.
The accounts have plowed most of their money into straightforward bets on Trump’s winning the presidency, but they have also put millions of dollars into bets that he will win such swing states as Pennsylvania, as well as long-shot bets on Trump’s winning the popular vote—smaller side markets also available on Polymarket.
Even many die-hard Trump fans consider it unlikely that he will win the majority of votes cast. Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 and 2020, winning the presidency in 2016 by capturing enough swing states to triumph in the Electoral College.
Adam Cochran, a veteran crypto investor who has monitored the activity on Polymarket, said the betting spree appears to be an attempt to generate a sense of momentum for Trump going into Election Day. If Trump loses, his favorable odds in the betting markets could bolster arguments that the election was stolen from him, said Cochran, who described himself as a right-of-center voter backing Harris….