Polymarket Surpasses $1B Monthly Trading Volume, Driven by U.S. Election Betting

Activity on Polymarket, the largest web3 prediction market platform, is rapidly accelerating in the lead-up to the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election.

On Oct. 17, Polymarket’s October volume surpassed $1 billion, marking the first time monthly volume on the platform has breached the 10-figure threshold.

October’s Polymarket volume has already beaten out September’s previous record of $503 million by more than double, with nearly $1.04 billion worth of trades placed and two weeks to go until the month ends, according to data from Dune. Monthly volume is also up more than 1,700% since January.

Polymarket volume and users. Source: Dune.

The platform recorded its highest single-day volume on Oct. 7, with a staggering $98.4 million traded. For context, Polymarket surpassed $100 million in monthly volume for the first time in June, with $111. 3 million traded during 30 days.

October has also hosted a record number of active Polymarket traders with 98,728 users already, a 2,328% increase since January.

U.S. election markets are dominating activity on the platform, accounting for approximately 95.4% of volume since Oct. 14. Three-quarters of Polymarket users participated in election markets over the same period.

Polymarket’sPresidential Election Winner 2024 market has hosted $2.05 billion in total trading volume, with $621 million wagered on Trump and over $413 million placed on Harris. The market currently implies a 60.9% chance of Trump winning the election.

App Store milestone

On Oct.17, Polymarket ranked as the top app on Apple’s U.S. App Store under the "Free Magazines and News" category, surpassing major news outlets including The New York Times, CNN, and The Wall Street Journal.

The app’s growing popularity on the App Store indicates U.S. users are still downloading the app in spite of geographic restrictions, suggesting many users are adopting VPNs to bypass restrictions and place bets.

In January 2022, Polymarket settled with the CFTC for $1.4 million over allegations of offering more than 900 event-based binary options markets to U.S. users without proper registration. After the settlement, the platform restricted access to U.S. users by blocking those with U.S. IP addresses.

Polymarket competition

On Aug. 29, Kalshi, a rival prediction market, received temporary permission from a Washington, D.C. appeals court to host election bets.

However, the platform’s presidential election market has recorded $25 million in total trading volume since.

Vega Protocol and Drift Protocol also launched prediction markets in early August.

However, Polymarket appears to be eying further expansion, with recent reports claiming that the company plans to soon raise $50 million, building on the $70 million it secured through two funding rounds earlier this year. The raise would reportedly include the issuance of token warrants, allowing investors to purchase a possible Polymarket token in the future.

Trump PAC raises $7.5M in crypto

Both Trump and Harris appear to be courting votes from crypto-natives and companies.

Trump, who once called Bitcoin a “scam” in 2021, has been actively courting the crypto vote in recent months with pledges to position the U.S. as a leader in the global Bitcoin mining industry.

A political action committee (PAC) supporting Trump’s presidential campaign raised approximately $7.5 million in cryptocurrencies from June 1 through Sept. 30. Contributions came in the form of Bitcoin, Ether, XRP, and USDC, according to a Federal Election Commission filing.

The filing reveals that 18 donors contributed over $5.5 million in BTC, while another seven individuals donated approximately $1.5 million in ETH. Major contributors include prominent figures in the industry such as Mike Belshe of BitGO and David Bailey of BTC Inc.

On the Democratic side, Harris has also sought to appeal to the web community and attracted donations from key crypto donors.

Filings show that Chris Larsen, the co-founder of Ripple, donated 1.75 million XRP worth $1 million to the pro-Harris PAC, Future Forward, on Aug. 14. The PAC has raised $200 million in total so far.