WSJ investigation: Creators posting bets on getting rich on Polymarket may be actors and hired shills

Jinse Finance reported that in January this year, George Makihara released a video showing he won $100,000 on Polymarket by betting that President Trump would publicly say the word “McDonald's” that month. According to his video, from January to mid-May, Makihara appears to have placed 145 bets on the Polymarket website — with a total value close to $410,000. However, according to an investigation by The Wall Street Journal, none of these bets were real. Based on analysis of over 1,100 videos, as well as training materials and interviews with creators who have worked with the company, he is one of dozens of paid creators employed by Polymarket. Most of these are university students who film themselves making fake transactions, sometimes pretending to win big prizes. Public data shows that on Polymarket’s real website, over 50 accounts placed bets on the “McDonald's” wager in January. All of these accounts lost. In an effort to attract users to its unregulated platform, Polymarket launched videos like Makihara’s on social media. In reality, Polymarket built an almost perfect replica of the actual website, then directed creators to make simulated trades on these mock sites and conceal the fact that they were paid by Polymarket. To boost the videos’ virality, Polymarket recruited a social media “army” to copy and repost the creators’ content.