The blockchain-powered top prediction market, Polymarket, has once again found itself in hot water due to manipulation allegations. This time, it's political, and users are weighing their legal options.
The company was forced to explain itself after its users noted that one prediction was resolved even before anything happened.
Users were betting on whether Ukraine would agree to US President Donald Trump's mineral deal before April, and the odds of this dropped to 9% earlier this week. However, the market, with more than $7 million in trading volume, was suddenly resolved to "yes."
Under normal circumstances, this would mean that Ukraine had agreed to the deal. However, as this hasn't happened in reality, Polymarket users claim that someone with a large position of UMA tokens manipulated the results. Polymarket bettors use UMA tokens to take positions on the outcome of specific events.
X user @Web3Marmot stressed that two previous markets related to the Ukraine deal were resolved as "No."
"Nothing has changed since then regarding the mineral deal. The only difference is that the markets were too small for those managing the results, so they had no interest there. This is absolutely disgusting and can only be called fraud," they said, urging people to stop using the platform if it doesn't take action.
@Web3Marmot also noted that someone voted from three accounts, comprising 25% of the total votes, effectively securing the win. Moreover, other markets were also noticed to have been resolved incorrectly.
Meanwhile, in an official response on its Discord channel, Polymarket said that because this wasn't a market failure, they are not able to issue refunds.
"This is an unprecedented situation, and we have been in war rooms all day internally and with the UMA team to make sure this won't happen again," they said, promising more details "as we better understand the situation and begin to build solutions for clearer rules."
However, this failed to appease users, as comments in the Trump/Ukraine market are calling it a scam and threatening legal action against the company.
"Everyone should check if their local consumer protection laws are undermined by the [Terms of Service]. If not sure, you can send a formal notice giving them 30 days to compensate you. Let's make their lawyers work overtime and get them banned from where you live if they don't make it right," user JODY said.
In any case, this is not the first time Polymarket has been accused of manipulation. As reported by Cybernews.com, last October, the market faced suspicions of manipulation related to a bitcoin creator identity bet.
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