There's now more than $7 million wagered on U.S. President Joe Biden dropping out of the election on crypto betting site Polymarket.
And after his performance during the first 2024 Presidential Election debate against presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, the odds that he will leave the race have spiked to 38%.
Meanwhile, the biggest political betting pool on the site—$191 million that's being wagered on the winner of the election—now shows a 63% chance that Trump will win in November. That's despite the fact that the former president is now a convicted felon and is still awaiting sentencing in July.
Polymarket, which raised $70 million in a new funding round earlier this year, has seen more than $328 million bet on different aspects of the U.S. election. Some of them have been downright bizarre.
There was $54,000 riding on whether Biden would close his eyes for more than 3 seconds during last night's debate. Another saw more than $200,000 bet on whether the incumbent would soil himself while standing at the podium—the outcome of which has since been declared "no."
There's $23,000 bet on whether independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who CNN excluded from the debate, will win or manage to place second in any state. Bettors have also have it at 28% odds that Biden begins accepting crypto donations before August.
The uptick in betting on Biden leaving the race has coincided with increased interest in the $60 million pool for predicting who will be named the Democratic nominee after the party's national convention in August. Bettors currently think Biden has a 61% chance of clinching the nomination—down from 90% less than 24 hours ago.
— Bold (@boldleonidas) June 28, 2024
The next most likely candidates to receive the Democratic nomination are California Governor Gavin Newsom at 16% and Vice President Kamala Harris at 8% odds. Gamblers think there's a higher chance, at 7%, that some unnamed other candidate takes the nomination than either former First Lady Michelle Obama or former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Biden's sometimes jilted and confusing speech during the debate has already become the subject of a Bold Leonidas cartoon, generated speculation about what mixture of supplements would have made him appear more alert, declarations that "it's over" for him.
Trump and Biden meme coins dive
Meanwhile PolitiFi meme coin traders seem to have already seized their opportunity to cash in after what was widely perceived as a win for Trump. The entire $1 billion category—comprised of 40 different meme coins on CoinGecko—has dropped 6% in the past 24 hours.
A handful of Trump-themed coins, MAGA (TRUMP), MAGA Hat (MAGA), and Donald Tremp (TREMP), have all dropped roughly 7% since this time yesterday. But that's nothing compared to Solana meme coin Jeo Boden (BODEN)—an intentional and goofy misspelling of Biden's name—which has plummeted 35% in the past 24 hours, according to CoinGecko data.
The Kamala Horris (KAMA), Obema (OBEMA), and Ruburt F Kenidy Jr (KENIDY) meme coins have gained 129% in the past day.
Keep in mind that the vast majority of these political meme coins trade for pennies and are extremely volatile. That makes them especially risky investments.
Ironically enough, the largest so-called political meme coin, ConstitutionDAO's PEOPLE governance token, doesn't have anything to do with the election. And the DAO itself hasn't been active since it tried (and failed) to win an auction for a copy of the U.S. Constitution in 2021. But it's still seen a 6% bump in the past day.