From getting rid of trouble to rebirth, understand the future of Polymarket

Deng Tong, Golden Finance

Polymarket became popular last year for accurately predicting the results of the US presidential election: during the election, when the polling data given by various polling agencies showed that Trump and Harris had a 50-50 chance of winning, Trump's winning rate on the Polymarket platform was always far ahead of his opponent, and Trump eventually won the election. Polymarket accurately predicted this result.

Recently, according to the official website, Polymarket has opened predictions for the 2028 US presidential election, which has attracted more than $1.1 million in participation. JD Vance leads with a 28% chance of winning, followed by Democratic candidate Gavin Newsom, and the current President Trump has a winning rate of only 3%.

In addition to opening predictions for the 2028 US presidential election, Polymarket is also conceiving the issuance of its own stablecoin. After the US Department of Justice concluded its investigation, the prediction market PolyMarket acquired a trading platform and resumed operations in the United States.

From getting rid of trouble to rebirth, what is the deep meaning behind Polymarket's series of new actions?

1. Get out of trouble: The U.S. Department of Justice ends its investigation into PolyMarket

On November 7, 2024, the French National Gaming Authority (ANJ) reviewed the operations of Polymarket, a cryptocurrency-based prediction market platform, to determine whether it complies with local regulations.

On November 13, 2024, the FBI seized the mobile phones and electronic devices of Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan. This action took place eight days after Polymarket successfully predicted that Trump would win the 2024 presidential election. The FBI suspected that the platform was manipulating the election market, which may be a "political retaliation" by the former government against Polymarket.

Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan once responded to the platform being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice: "The current government is taking a last-ditch effort to hunt down companies they believe are associated with political opponents. We are firmly committed to nonpartisanship, and today is no exception, but the current government should do some self-reflection and realize that taking a more business-friendly and entrepreneurial approach may change their fate in this election. Polymarket has provided value to tens of millions of people in this election cycle without hurting anyone. We are very proud of this. I can hold my head high and say that the future of the United States, especially the future of American entrepreneurship, has never been so bright. In the face of adversity, we continue to build."

With Trump's coming to power, U.S. crypto regulatory policy has ushered in a major shift. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has withdrawn more than a dozen investigations and ongoing lawsuits against cryptocurrency companies, and banking regulators have also relaxed their review of financial services companies that intend to engage in cryptocurrency activities. Polymarket has finally gotten rid of trouble.

On July 15, 2025, Bloomberg reported that relevant departments had terminated their investigation into Polymarket.The previous investigation was about whether the platform accepted transactions from local U.S. users. Spokespersons for the U.S. Department of Justice, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and Polymarket declined to comment.

Second, Nirvana: Polymarket restarts its business in the U.S.

Polymarket’s two recent moves are: acquiring derivatives exchange QCX and issuing its own stablecoin. At a time when U.S. regulatory policies are becoming increasingly relaxed, Polymarket seems confident in its layout in the U.S. market.

1. Compliance layout in the US market: Acquisition of derivatives exchange QCX

On July 21, Polymarket announced that it had completed the acquisition of the holding company of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)-authorized derivatives exchange (QCX, LLC) and clearing agency (QC Clearing LLC) (collectively referred to as "QCEX") for US$112 million. The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) approved QCX's operations on July 9, two years after the exchange first applied for a license.

As early as 2022, Polymarket reached a settlement with the CFTC and stopped providing services to US users. Now, Polymarket's acquisition will reopen the US market - providing Polymarket with a legal way to re-enter the US market. The acquisition marks a significant step for Polymarket to expand access to its category-defining platform in the United States, enabling more users to trade prediction market contracts with regulatory clarity.

Polymarket Founder and CEO Shayne Coplan said: "Polymarket is the world's largest prediction market and has become synonymous with understanding the probabilities of current events. Demand is stronger than ever - not only in user growth and trading volume, but also in how mainstream audiences are turning to Polymarket to identify the correlation between signal and noise, bias and guesswork. Now, with the acquisition by QCEX, we are laying the foundation for Polymarket's return - to the U.S. as a fully regulated and compliant platform, allowing Americans to freely exchange ideas."

Sergei Dobrovolskii, Founder of QCEX said: "When we began applying for DCM and DCO licenses more than four years ago, prediction markets were in their infancy. But we have always believed in their potential to change the way people access and understand information and express their opinions. Shayne is a member of the Polymarket team and a member of the board of directors. Created a cultural phenomenon. I am very happy to bring our two companies together and use our licenses, technology and expertise in the retail trading field to help Polymarket realize its full potential. ”

2. Focus on new profit points in crypto: may launch its own stablecoin

With the recent passage of stablecoin-related legislation in the United States, the issuance of stablecoins has become a new profit point in the eyes of crypto companies and traditional financial institutions. 

According to people familiar with the matter,Crypto prediction market platform Polymarket is evaluating the possibility of launching its own stablecoin in order to control the income brought by the high reserve funds supported by Circle's USDC.At present, the platform has not made a final decision and is also weighing the option of reaching a revenue sharing agreement with Circle. Since the Polymarket ecosystem is closed, it only needs to realize the exchange between USDC and its customized stablecoin, without facing the compliance difficulties of "deposit and withdrawal", making the issuance of stablecoins more feasible in terms of technology and regulation.

Industry insiders believe that: For Polymarket, it is much easier to issue its own stablecoin from a regulatory perspective. "Polymarket has locked a large amount of stablecoins in its betting pool, so they hope to obtain returns through some mechanism. As far as Polymarket is concerned, it is a closed ecosystem, and all they really need to do is be able to exchange USDC or USDT for any stablecoin they customize. They don't have to worry about the last mile of entry and exit. This is easy to build and easy to protect and control."

Because Polymarket operates a closed-loop system where users use stablecoins to trade prediction markets without external payment flows, creating a native token pegged to the US dollar requires very few infrastructure changes.

By potentially launching its own stablecoin, Polymarket will seek to bring value capture closer to the application layer, a shift that could redefine the economics of blockchain-based financial services. If Polymarket launches its own stablecoin in the future, the impact could far exceed the benefits to the platform itself. It may encourage other dApps and DeFi protocols to launch their own native stable assets, creating a more segmented but efficient ecosystem.

Other analysts believe that Polymarket's stablecoin could consolidate its position in the prediction market space. By simplifying transactions, reducing fees and potentially attracting institutional participation, the stablecoin could serve as a bridge for users to hedge bets on volatile assets such as Bitcoin. Stablecoins can speed up the settlement of bets and reduce the volatility risk of third-party stablecoins, which is consistent with Polymarket's goal of becoming a real-time data-driven speculation center. This move enables the platform to fully leverage its user-driven model while addressing operational and regulatory challenges in a rapidly evolving industry. However, challenges remain, such as regulatory barriers in the United States and the need for transparent reserve management to maintain trust.

III. Conclusion

Vitalik Buterin once pointed out: "Polymarket is unique because its growth period coincides with a real social problem and is suitable for helping to solve it (in 2024, all parties have a huge distrust of partisan media in the United States and elsewhere). What specific large-scale social problems are crypto technologies suitable for helping to solve now or in the near future? (In fact, we want to find situations involving the collapse of centralized institutions, distrust, or widespread perception of harm, and there is a large demand to bypass them)."

Polymarket has become famous for accurately predicting the results of the 2024 US election. The recent move to open the 2028 US presidential election prediction shows Polymarket's determination to continue to deepen the political event prediction market. However, in the future development process, how to achieve compliance development in the United States and launch its own stablecoin, and how to always answer people's questions about public events truthfully and transparently are issues that Polymarket needs to continue to think about.

Polymarket's development history is a microcosm of the cryptocurrency industry's continuous exploration and innovation in a complex regulatory environment and fierce market competition. From getting rid of regulatory difficulties to re-planning the future, every step of Polymarket is full of unknown challenges and unexpected gains. At the same time, Polymarket also provides an example of how encryption technology can be used to solve social problems, inspiring the entire industry to try in more areas.