Miami Beach — When Shayne Coplan launched Polymarket, he didn’t have a team or significant funding. What I had was a blockchain, a strong conviction, and a laptop.
“I’m a solo founder. I literally started with almost no money,” Coplan said during a conversation at the Cantor Fitzgerald Cryptocurrency, AI and Blockchain conference in Miami Beach on Wednesday. “The nice thing about blockchain is that it allows a kid in his room (or bathroom or office or whatever) to go and innovate and experiment with financial applications.”
He credited the open nature of blockchain for allowing him to create a functional global market without traditional institutional support. “The barrier to entry to building something innovative in traditional fintech is prohibitive for anyone who is trying to build something new, who is young and doesn’t have a lot of capital and doesn’t have a lot of time,” he said.
Polymarket, launched in 2020, allows users to trade based on the probability of real-world outcomes, from elections to Federal Reserve decisions to celebrity gossip. The platform does not work with survey data or expert predictions. Instead, let the market determine the probabilities.
“When people follow an election, or an election that has implications for their livelihood, they want to know who is going to win,” Coplan said. “Polls are fine, there’s a random assortment of people here… but they consistently lean one way or the other. It’s just noise.”
He believes markets offer something more honest: a price backed by conviction and risk.
“We have this cycle where every time there’s a big election, everyone flocks to Polymarket, everyone checks it out. Then everyone comes and makes up a conspiracy theory about why it’s not accurate,” he said. “If Cuomo is trading at 5 cents to make $1… if it’s actually worth 40 or 50 cents and trading at 5 cents, you should buy it. You should put your money where your mouth is.”
Each transaction on Polymarket is peer-to-peer and prices reflect collective belief. “It doesn’t depend on how much money was allocated to each candidate,” Coplan explained. “At any given time, there are stocks yes… and if you look at the order book, there are bids and offers.
Whatever the midpoint is, that’s the probability. That is the present value of earning $1 if it is correct.”
Beyond politics, Coplan sees broader potential: prediction markets as decision-making tools, including in public policy.
“You can say: What is the probability that Cuomo will win if Sliwa does not retire and what is the probability that he will win if he does retire?” said. “Markets, if structured correctly, can help decision-making in society on an unprecedented scale.”
Coplan also believes that Polymarket can compete with legacy betting platforms by offering something that traditional sportsbooks cannot: fairness.
“If you’re betting or negotiating the outcome of a game… there’s a monopoly on pricing. You’re always negotiating against the house,” he said. “They can set whatever prices they want. If you make any money, they can ban you. They can profile you and give you worse prices or put a cap on you.”
“This is America. You see something so inefficient and rigged against the consumer (when it’s a financial market, but it’s positioned as an entertainment product designed to make you lose) you can’t complain when alternatives appear in the financial market.”
Coplan envisions Polymarket eventually playing a role in sectors such as insurance, where consumers often face bundled services and high premiums.
“A lot of times, if you’re doing layoffs or trying to protect against some kind of exotic risk, you’re dealing with a company that has a sales team, a risk department… you usually end up paying really bad prices,” he said. “The amazing thing about Polymarket is that you can see people creating a Polymarket for the same type of risk…people in the risk pricing business can provide liquidity. People good at sales can go in and allow them to hedge those risks.”
He also touched on the role that AI agents could soon play in trading markets. “You see a lot of people experimenting with these AI agents that can measure sentiment, monitor the news and basically form their own opinion… when they see a mistake in pricing, they can try to correct the market,” he said. “Even if there is very little liquidity, or a small liquidity subsidy, these agents will disappear and people will compete to create the most accurate agents.”
Coplan said much of Polymarket’s potential lies in the long tail of niche markets (anything related to uncertainty). “Will it generate a lot of volume? No. But will it unlock a new information format? Yes,” he said. “Polymarket probabilities (the percentage chance of something) could be extended to a much larger range of opportunities.”
As Polymarket prepares to expand its US presence and add new users through a beta exchange, Coplan remains focused on staying ahead of legacy institutions and building a platform that delivers on the original promise of blockchain.
“We’re just trying to create the best product,” he said. “Something people love to use, where your opinion really matters.”
