Polymarket Hit by $160M Controversy Over Whether or not Ukraine’s President Zelensky Wore a Go well with at NATO
Crypto-focused prediction market Polymarket is going through a contemporary dose of criticism this week in relation to a market on whether or not Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy would put on a swimsuit earlier than July.
Greater than $160 million price of crypto was guess in the marketplace, with the preliminary final result of “sure” being disputed by the validators behind UMA, the oracle protocol that determines the outcomes.
The value of “sure” has now plummeted to $0.04 from $0.19, giving an implied chance of final result at simply 4%. The “sure” voters are putting again, claiming that Zelenskyy did certainly put on a swimsuit on the NATO summit on June 24 and that there may very well be foul play by UMA validators to swing the choice.
The validators are holders of UMA protocol tokens, who get to vote on the veracity of the real-world knowledge that is encoded within the protocol’s oracle. In concept, a large-enough swathe of token-holders might manipulate a outcome to their very own selecting.
This isn’t the primary time there was a divide between Polymarket and UMA communities. In March one other Ukrainian-themed market was disputed amid claims of manipulation from massive holders of UMA.
“Everyone knows the whales are attempting to rig the UMA vote on the Zelensky swimsuit market,” X consumer Atlantislq wrote. “However that doesn’t imply we should always keep silent. This can be a essential second Polymarket claims to care about reality and decentralization so let’s maintain them to it.”
AI chat bot Grok took the facet of “sure” voters, saying that “Zelenskyy wore a swimsuit in June 2025.”
On the opposite facet, fashionable menswear influencer and author who goes by the moniker “derek man” guess $3.6 million in the marketplace resolving as “no.” He stands to make $72,000 if the guess is profitable.
A closing decision in the marketplace will likely be made at 00:00 UTC on July 8.
