Polymarket Losers Are Discovering an Age-Old Truth: Aaron Brown

Coverage of prediction platform Polymarket has recently converged on a single statistic, delivered with the cadence of a verdict: Most users lose money. The top 1% of accounts capture roughly three-quarters of the gains, while most traders since 2022 are underwater.

These numbers are accurate — and meaningless. They describe a general property of retail derivatives venues and betting markets. Some 1.3% of daily fantasy sports players took 91% of the profits in 2015. Of Brazilian retail futures traders who persisted past 300 days, 97% lost money. Retail equity options traders lose 5% to 9% per earnings-announcement trade. A ...