Polymarket Crypto Bettors Place Parlays on the Paris Olympics

With an extravagant opening ceremony, the 2024 Paris Olympics are underway—and millions of dollars in crypto bets have already been placed on the wildly popular Polymarket. 

So much so that the decentralized crypto-powered platform now has an “Olympics” category. A total of $1.2 million has already been placed on bets predicting which country will win the most medals. 

After that, punters have put $1.1 million on which country will win the most gold medals.  The U.S. is the favorite to scoop up the most, with $168,711 being dropped on the nation.

There are a number of wagers available for individual sports, such as the gold medal winners in men’s and women’s basketball, with $355K and $101K respectively riding on the outcome. Soccer and several swimming contests follow.

So far, not many individual athletes have appeared on the site—except for American swimmer Katie Ledecky and Spanish tennis player Rafael Nadal. Gamblers can place bets on the number of gold medals each will win.

Polymarket has exploded in popularity as of late. People around the world can bet on everything from politics and sports to what a high-profile person will say on television. The platform runs on two major blockchains: Ethereum and Polygon. 

Trading volume this month soared as users increasingly put bets on the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. 

In fact, the November election has become such a hot topic, a bet on the platform about the candidates even slid into the Olympics category. “This market is on whether Joe Biden or Donald Trump will walk up the stairs to board a plane faster, based on the next made video recording of each boarding a plane after July 25, 12:30 PM ET,” it explains.

Some $5,500 has been placed on the “Staircase Olympics” as of today. As if things couldn’t get any weirder.

Edited by Ryan Ozawa.