Polymarket gamblers betting millions on war

cyanydeez

'Capitalism': the inevitable reduction of all humanity to fungible currency

srameshc

> There is now more than $500,000 (£371,000) staked on whether Russia will capture Kostyantynivka this year . Now everyone has a chance to profit from war ! Thank you Polymarket

Chrisszz

This is becoming the kind of "VC platform for online war investments". You: 1. Plan 2. Bet 3. Invest money upfront 4. Execute 5. Redeem your profits

BobbyTables2

Reminds me of the part in National Lampoon’s Vegas Vacation when Clark Griswold goes to the 3rd rate casino and starts betting on weird things.

arter45

So... >“It used to be the news channels were the callers,” said Kane. “They used to be the final say in big events. Like this officially happened because CNN and Fox News said so. But thanks to Polymarket, there’s a new signal.” This is interesting because of this: >At the moment, when there is a dispute, markets on Polymarket are settled by an anonymous group of people who hold a crypto token called UMA. [...] >It isn’t known who the largest UMA holders are, or what might affect how they vote. It is entirely possible that the people who finally settle a bet on UMA have large amounts of money staked on it. So basically instead of trusting CNN and Fox News you trust an anonymous group of people who may or may not profit themselves from their own decisions. I can't see how this is any better.

nunez

Not a new phenomenon! It happened during the War on Iraq. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/02/weekinreview/you-can-bet-... People will bet on absolutely anything; gambling is as old as time itself. > Wagering was generally legal under British common law, so long as it did not to lead to immortality or impolity.13 Bets about the outcome of events in war, over the death of political leaders, over court cases, or between voters over election results were illegal on these grounds.14 In the Victorian and Edwardian periods, the British government increasingly attempted to limit gambling, especially among the working classes. The Gaming Act of 1845 made gambling contracts and debts unenforceable in court (but otherwise liberalized what amounts could be wagered); the Betting Houses Act of 1853 outlawed the operation of betting establishments other than private clubs; the Betting Houses Act of 1874 cracked down of the advertisement of wagering; and the Street Betting Act of 1906 made acceptance of wagers in streets and public places illegal.15 Despite the legal uncertainty in the late 19th and early 20th century, the Fleet Street press reported on election wagering at the London Stock Exchange and at Lloyd’s in markets for Parliamentary “majorities.” [^0] [^0] Rhode, Paul W. “The Long History of Political Betting Markets.” KU School of Business, 2012 March. https://users.wfu.edu/strumpks/papers/Int_Election_Betting_F...

api

Any time the headline is gamblers making millions the reality is 90% of gamblers losing, maybe 9% breaking even or making small wins, and a few making millions.

CrzyLngPwd

Do they allow for bets like how many civilians killed by Israel during April? Or how many schools are bombed by the USA? Or how many times will it take the USA to declare victory before the end of the conflict?

hank2000

Imagine a bunch of people are tortured, removed from their homes, are killed… and you get paid? Are you cheering for it because you’re getting paid? I can’t imagine wanting to be cheering on death and destruction.

PaulRobinson

Every shareholder of an arms company (or holder of an index tracker), is betting on war too. This mechanism is stupid, corrupt and driving extreme behaviour. But betting on war is not new, and I find it abhorrent that people will hand wave away the military-industrial complex as an essential component to modern civilisation while calling individuals making bets on war horrible names. It's just scale and semantics, not core differences to my eye.

daft_pink

Just want to reiterate that prediction markets are beneficial, because they are the most accurate way to provide us with a dynamic mechanism to predict future outcomes from complicated systems. As was put forth in James Suroweicki’s the Wisdom of Crowds, prediction markets provide predictions that tend to be more accurate than any expert, team of experts, etc. That doesn’t mean it’s 100% accurate, but it tends to be more accurate than any other mechanism that we have. The benefit is not that gamblers have a place to gamble, but that society has a way to gauge the risks of different outcomes and plan accordingly.