The FBI seized Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan’s phone and electronics on Nov. 13, according to the New York Post reported, citing a source.
According to the report, the source said the administration would try to accuse Polymarket of market manipulation and manipulating its polls in favor of Trump. However, at the time of writing, there is no confirmation of the source’s claims.
Additionally, the source said that Coplan was woken up at 6 a.m. ET by law enforcement officers at his Soho home, who confiscated his devices without providing a clear explanation.
The source also emphasized that the government could have requested the devices through Coplan’s lawyer instead of staging an early morning seizure.
Accusations of political motivations
The source claimed the seizure was politically motivated, calling it “grand political theater at worst” and speculating that authorities targeted Polymarket for its accurate prediction of the election outcome. It added:
“This is clear political retaliation by the outgoing administration against Polymarket for providing a market that rightly called the 2024 presidential election.”
Polymarket’s predictions in particular were more accurately then polls in the mainstream media, with Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin praising the potential of the platform as an effective source of information.
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Gino Matos
Gino Matos is a law graduate and a seasoned journalist with six years of experience in the crypto industry. His expertise focuses primarily on the Brazilian blockchain ecosystem and developments in decentralized finance (DeFi).