During the entire election period this year, the most popular application in the cryptocurrency circle, apart from Pump.Fun, should be the prediction market Polymarket. Due to the excellent operation of Polymarket during the election, coupled with the promotion of Trump and some KOLs, the positioning of "who can bet on the next president on Polymarket" spread rapidly. The transaction volume related to the president continued to increase as the election night approached, until noon on November 6, when too many people flocked to the Polymarket website, causing its server to crash briefly.

Throughout the election cycle, compared with the predictions of traditional polling agencies, the changes in odds on Polymarket have always been highly sensitive to news. Funds always precede news. When the winners of swing states have not yet been decided, the odds of Trump's victory on Polymarket have already increased.

The cumulative trading volume of election prediction transactions on Polymarket has reached $3,612,184,597. The trading volume of Republican candidate Trump related transactions on Polymarket is close to $1.48 billion, and the trading volume of Democratic candidate Harris is $1.01 billion.

Leading traditional polls and gaining popularity

On November 6, Polymarket data showed that Trump’s probability of winning had experienced significant fluctuations. At 1 a.m., Trump's victory percentage stood at 59.4%, after briefly rising to 63% earlier in the day. By 9:46 a.m., Trump's probability of victory had risen to 71.1%, while Harris's had dropped to 29.1%. As of 11:17 a.m., Trump’s probability of winning had climbed further, reaching 88.6%. Since then, Trump has been leading the vote in key swing states. The odds on Polymarket have changed very quickly, and everyone is talking with money.

According to Protos data, Polymarket and Kalshi were compared side by side with the election odds from The New York Times and Nate Silver, and the differences were obvious. For example, on October 31, Trump's chance of winning the US election was 66% on Polymarket, but only 48% on The Hill.

Looking at a wider sample, the average of traditional polling agencies such as Nate Silver, NYT or FiveThirtyEight shows that Trump and Harris have been within a few basis points in the past period of time. Obviously, judging from the results, the results given by Polymarket based on trading activities are more convincing than those of traditional polling agencies.

On November 6, according to data from the app analytics platform SensorTower, the regulated prediction market platform Kalshi is currently ranked first in Apple's financial app category and also ranked first in free apps. At the same time, Polymarket has also risen to second place in the free app rankings, which is the highest ranking for both apps to date.

Who wins and who loses?

Crypto prediction markets have always been seen as products with strong cyclicality and only specific application scenarios, such as political elections and sports events. As the US election cycle draws to a close, the future development of Polymarket will be the focus of many people's attention, but at present, the most eye-catching is this $3.6 billion election transaction. Under the heavy bet, French trader Théo spent $45 million on Trump, and eventually became the most profitable user on Polymarket.

In August, Théo sent dozens of emails to Wall Street Journal reporters criticizing mainstream media polls that he believed favored Harris. In a Zoom call, he claimed that Democratic-backed media were paving the way for social unrest by touting a tight race, when he expected a landslide victory for Trump. Théo said he was surprised by the attention to his trading and began making low-profile bets in August, buying millions of dollars in contracts on Trump's victory using the username Fredi 9999. At the time, the odds on Trump and Harris on Polymarket were roughly even.

To avoid wild price swings, Théo spread his bets over multiple days. However, as his bets grew, Théo noticed that other traders would avoid quotes when buying Fredi 9999, making it difficult for him to place bets at the ideal price. He created three additional accounts in September and October to mask his buying.

If Trump wins and sweeps the election as he expects, Théo could make more than $80 million, doubling his bets. His main bet is that Trump wins the electoral vote, and he’s betting millions more on Trump winning the popular vote — a scenario many observers consider unlikely. He’s also betting on Trump winning in swing states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Related reading: (30 million bets on Trump's victory, this mysterious whale said: just to make money)

Today, the election results are finally announced, and one of Théo’s accounts, Fredi 9999, has made a total profit of $16.47 million.

Taking the four betting options under the "Who will win the presidential election" transaction with the largest trading volume under the political election topic on Polymarket as an example, BlockBeats lists the users with the largest profits and losses below.

Trump

The following figure shows the distribution of bets on whether Trump will be elected president by users on Polymarket. The "supporters" on the left represent users who believe Trump will be elected, among which the largest holder "zxgngl" holds 29,473,073 shares, with a total profit of $11.315 million. Other major supporters include the aforementioned "Fredi 9999" and "walletmobile".

The “opponents” on the right are users who believe that Trump will not be elected. The largest holder, “I 95153360”, holds 7, 107, 980 shares and currently has a loss of $1.192 million.

Harris

The following figure shows the distribution of bets on whether Harris will be elected president by users on Polymarket. The "supporters" on the left represent those users who think Harris will be elected. The largest holder "leier" holds 10, 871, 056 shares, and the total loss of this user has reached 4.99 million US dollars. Other major supporters include "StarVoting" and "Ly 67890".

The “opponents” on the right are users who believe that Harris will not be elected. The largest holder is “COMMA-luh”, who holds 4, 878, 533 shares. In addition, this user also placed bets on the “Trump will be elected president” transaction, with a total profit of over $210,000.