Investigation: Polymarket is paying creators to make deceptive videos about winning bets, targeting users in the US, where its primary crypto platform is banned
The prediction market has flooded social media with deceptive videos by paid creators, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation
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Polymarket Caught Paying Creators for Deceptive Betting Ads
WSJ investigation reveals Polymarket funded misleading social media videos targeting US users where it's banned.
Polymarket has a deceptive marketing problem. A Wall Street Journal investigation found the crypto prediction market has been paying content creators to produce misleading videos about winning bets — and pushing them directly at US audiences.
That's a big deal, because Polymarket's primary crypto platform is banned in the United States. The paid videos flooded social media, painting a rosy picture of easy betting wins to lure users in a market they technically can't legally access.
The scheme amounts to a coordinated influencer campaign built on deception. Creators were compensated to fabricate or exaggerate their betting success stories, turning social feeds into a pipeline for a platform operating outside US regulatory boundaries.
For a company that built its reputation on transparent prediction markets, the irony is thick. Deceptive marketing to dodge geographic restrictions is a fast track to regulatory heat.