They say that there is no better survey than that done with the money that people are willing to bet on the outcome of an event. Following this guessing methodology, there is a 51% chance that Gouveia and Melo will win the elections — and Sporting will win the Champions League faster than Benfica.
The committee responsible for awarding the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize is investigating suspicions of leakage of internal information or espionage, following a case of massive online betting that suggest there was prior knowledge that the Venezuelan Maria Corina Machado would win the prize.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee on Friday, around 10 am, that the leader of the opposition to Nicolás Maduro’s government had been awarded the award this year.
Although, the night beforeon Thursday, a popular prediction site of all kinds began to appear, pointing to the victory of the Venezuelan opponent.
Mass betting made the chances of victory skyrocket by Corina Machado, who at 1am on the 9th it had just 0.8% of probability, against the 9.5% of the favorite at the time, Yulia Navalnayawidow of former Russian opponent Alexei Navalny.
Shortly before the announcement of the Nobel Peace Prize winner, her chances of winning had risen to 72.8%. Someone, at the last minute, bet a lot of money on Corina Machado’s victory — and, given the odds that the Venezuelan had then, this bet probably yielded a few million dollars.
ZAP // Polymarket
Evolution of predictions about the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner at Polymarket
Someone knew Corina was going to winand he was sure enough to bet his money on that outcome.
“Espionage against the Norwegian Nobel Committee is, unfortunately, well known, both for political and economic reasons,” he said. Erik Aasheimspokesperson for the Norwegian Nobel Institute, in a statement cited by .
“Prior to this year’s announcement, we noticed that some people made significant financial gains by placing bets on this year’s prize. We will investigate whether this indicates that someone will have obtained information from us illicitly,” added Aasheim.
It is now up to the Nobel Committee to determine whether the phenomenon originated from a leak of internal information and we are facing a case of insider tradingor if it was simply an action of old-fashioned espionage — of which the organization has been a frequent victim.
And while the case investigation continues in its footsteps, ZAP decided to investigate another facet of the episode: what exactly goes on at Polymarket.
Everything and more I don’t know what
Prediction markets like Polymarket gained prominence during the presidential campaign in the United States last year, in particular after the bets correctly predicted Donald Trump’s victory.
In fact, there are those who say that there is no better poll than what is done with the money that people are willing to bet the outcome of a given event.
We took a look at what types of topics bettors go to Polymarket to invest in their predictions. Without much surprise, we found that on the website predictions of everything and more I don’t know what, as a well-known comedian says in a campaign for a brand we cannot name.
Most of the predictions address topics of international politics, economics, sport, technology, geopolitics or culture. Some more expected, others a little surprising — as well as their results.
One of the predictions gives one of the USA and Venezuela come into conflict before October 31. The probability rises to 38% by December 31st. In another prediction, we learn that there is a 13% chance of North and South Korea in 2025.
According to one of the predictions, there is only a 69% probability that it is Time’s next Person of the Year, and 14% that it is.
There’s a little bit of everything at Polymarket. in 2025 (8%), and it will be with Travis Kelce (21%). However, the American singer’s gynecologist still makes a small fortune from these predictions.
Some of the bets that can be placed are a little bizarre. It’s possible to bet that . Apparently, it is unlikely to happen, because the probability is less than 1%.
It also seems unlikely that conclusive evidence will appear, by December 31, 2025, that: probability is also <1%.
But there is apparently cause for concern about the possibility of the world ending by the end of the year: there is a 18% probability that one will happen to Earth — or so think the bettors who have already thrown away their money on this prediction.
Who will be the next president
According to everything, or, better said, according to Polymarket’s predictions, the next president of the Republic will be Henrique Gouveia e Melo.
At the time of this edition, the former admiral has one chance to win the presidential elections. It went down: a few hours ago, it was 52%. In second position in the forecast, with 20% and also falling, Luís Marques Mendesfollowed by André Ventura (14%) and António José Seguro (12%), both rising.
These values are not, of course, predictions of the distribution of votes, but of the probable outcome of the electoral act which will take place on January 18, 2026.
According to another prediction about the presidential elections that we found on Polymarket, there is only an 11% chance that the winning candidate will succeed.
We found two more predictions about Portugal. In one of them, we learned that our selection has the 2026 Football World Cup, behind Spain (19%), France (14%), Brazil (12%) and England (12%), and ahead of Argentina, the current World Champion (10%).
In the other, we realize that the faster Sporting wins the Champions League League than Benfica. At the time of this edition, both Portuguese clubs have a chance to win UEFA’s most important competition, whose favorite is PSG, current holder of the trophy (15%).
However, the Alvalade club has odds lower, that is, in theory, higher probability: every dollar bet on Sporting pays 200 dollarswhile the bet on Clube da Luz victory pays 250 dollars per dollar invested. But in practice, the premium depends on the volume being invested in each of the forecasts.
Unfortunately, if we believe in the wisdom of Polymarket bettors, it is as likely that we will witness the victory of a Portuguese club in the Champions League this year as it is that Jesus Christ will come down to Earth. Or maybe it turns out that it really is flat after all.
