Polymarket Hits Highest Weekly Trading Volume Since US Elections

Polymarket's prediction markets just roared back to life, hitting their best weekly trading volume since the frenzy of the 2024 US elections.

Betting on the Future, Bypassing Wall Street

Forget traditional polls and punditry. The surge in activity suggests traders are flocking to put real money on geopolitical and economic outcomes, using crypto to bypass the gatekeepers of conventional finance. It's a pure, unvarnished signal of crowd sentiment—arguably more honest than any analyst's report funded by banking fees.

Volume as a Vote of Confidence

This isn't just about more bets being placed. Rising volume on a platform like Polymarket acts as a powerful vote of confidence in the underlying mechanism. It validates the model of decentralized information markets, where liquidity and accuracy feed each other in a virtuous cycle that traditional markets can only mimic with far more friction and far less transparency.

The Cynical Take

Let's be real—when trust in institutions wavers, people start hedging their bets literally. The return to election-level trading volume might say less about crypto's novelty and more about a growing appetite to financially speculate on chaos, a sadly timeless human tradition now supercharged by blockchain. The house always wins, but now the house is just a smart contract.

Polymarket is yet to see significant volumes from its US business, as it is still unrolling in a closed beta with limited onboarding passes. However, sports and current events, along with short-term crypto price predictions, have worked to bring higher traffic and trading volumes.

Based on Artemis data, weekly spot volumes on Polymarket set a new volume above $1.25B. The increased volumes reflect a mix of new trader inflows, the introduction of short-term settlement markets, and the usage of automated trading. 

After the past three months of growth and new types of pair offerings, Polymarket proved its activity was not a one-off event and could expand further, even with increased competition. It reported more site visits compared to DraftKings and Fan Duel, and moved ahead of Kalshi, after the two platforms were almost tied in the previous months. 

Open interest remains below the biggest bet in the history of Polymarket, still signaling a shift to small-scale predictions. The US Presidential Elections still remain the peak of open interest, including international whales and much larger stakes. 

Polymarket shifts volumes from other exchanges

In November, Polymarket turned into the most visited crypto site, standing just behind Robinhood and Coinbase. The prediction platform achieved 19.9M visits in October, shared by the site’s founder, Shayne Coplan. 

For crypto natives, predictions are also displacing other types of trading, becoming more attractive due to quick settlement and a fairer trading venue.

Volumes have shifted from centralized exchanges to prediction platforms in the past weeks, bringing the ratio of prediction to CEX activity to 0.58%. Prediction markets remain relatively small, but are drawing in traders from other slowing sectors, including perpetual futures, memes, DEX activity, and other markets.

Bot trading adds to volume

Some of the recent Polymarket volumes may be due to the inflow of automated trading. On-chain analysis has identified accounts that show signs of automation. 

Some of the bots have achieved a long winning streak through betting on niche markets and taking profits frequently. Other users are trying to gain access to quick information on market resolutions, buying just before the market resolves. 

Bots on Polymarket are still focusing on the most liquid prediction pairs, while individual traders are seeking less popular markets with low activity.

Copy-trading bots, however, may be more risky, and some of the links for copy-trading prominent Polymarket bots may be malicious.

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