- Trump and Harris faced off in their first debate on Tuesday night.
- Neither of the candidates brought up crypto.
- Bettors put $14 million in debate-related bets on Polymarket.
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump faced off on Tuesday night in a live television debate.
For crypto, it was another opportunity for both candidates to bring attention to the industry and flesh out their positions.
But that didn’t happen. Over the course of the debate, which ran almost two hours, the presidential candidates discussed foreign policy, immigration, and the track records of their respective administrations — without mentioning crypto once.
Bitcoin dropped 1% to $57,000.
It was Harris and Trump’s first live confrontation, but the second presidential debate of the 2024 election cycle. The first debate, between Trump and President Joe Biden, happened in June. Days later Biden dropped out of the race.
Polymarket bettors assigned a 19% chance that Trump would mention Bitcoin or crypto during the debate, and a 9% chance that Harris would.
For comparison, the market gave 44% odds of bringing up Bitcoin in his face-off against Biden, which he didn’t do then either.
The omission of crypto by both candidates was a letdown for those in the industry who have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into lobbying efforts to make digital assets a key issue this election cycle.
The letdown for punters who bet on a crypto mention comes on top of sweeping criticism towards prediction markets.
While Polymarket’s backers celebrate its ability to let people make money on what they know best, detractors warn that its methodology for predicting the future is flawed — at least compared to traditional polls.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has even proposed to ban “event contracts,” which is another name for prediction markets like Polymarket.
The fear is that betting on events like assassinations and elections are not just morally questionable, but also risks eroding democracies.
Trump and Harris
Traditionally crypto agnostic, Trump began making overtures to the crypto industry in May.
Since then, he has promised to pardon Silk Road creator Ross Ulbricht, has met with Bitcoin mining executives, and has sworn to fire crypto’s favourite nemesis, Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler, on the first day of his new term.
The Trump campaign is also planning on launching its own DeFi platform, World Liberty Financial. Code tests suggest the team could end up reaping $537 million from the project.
Harris, for her part, has yet to articulate her stance on crypto.
Almost immediately after Biden dropped out, the Harris campaign said that she wanted to “reset” the Democratic Party’s relationship with crypto after the Biden administration has been seen as hostile towards the industry.
Her staffing choices, however, seem to indicate that her crypto policies will likely be a continuation of Biden’s.
Polymarket bets
The Biden-Trump face-off was a major event for Polymarket — gamblers piled at least $2.5 million in debate-related wagers.
But the Trump-Harris debate blew that figure out of the water. At the onset of the event, almost $14 million had been bet on various outcomes across 20 different markets.
Some of the wagers were on questions such as “Will Trump and Harris shake hands?” and “Will Trump use a slur during the debate?”.
More than $4 million was bet on specific words or phrases that the candidates might use, including ‘Comrade Kamala’ and ‘tampon’ for Trump, and ‘weird’ and ‘convicted felon’ for Harris.
Tom Carreras writes about markets for DL News. Got a tip about Trump, Harris, and Bitcoin? Reach out at tcarreras@dlnews.com.
