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US did not invade Venezuela by the definition of the bet. >This market will resolve to "Yes" if the United States commences a military offensive intended to es

• ajross 9mo ago
  POTUS literally, literally announced that the US had control over all (!) of Venezuela. Now, sure, that's kind of a lie. But (ahem) By The Definition of The Bet, actual control is not required. Only a military offensive intended to establish control. What purer definition of intent can you have than the decisionmaker's literal statement? QED. No, this is cheating. Now, sure, the bets placed seemed very likely to be fraudulent. Which is cheating too. But there's not "technically" here. Polymarket is playing games with its bets. And that's fraud, even if it's got company.
  • deleted 9mo ago
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  • lxgr 9mo ago
    Polymarket is not a broker, counterparty, or even resolver, so the only thing they can arguably be criticized for is hosting a market without a sufficiently clear definition of "invasion".
    • ajross 9mo ago
      How can they not be a "broker" when they handled the transaction?! How can they not be a "resolver" when they're the ones refusing to pay based on their own determination? Also, what definition of "invasion" are you thinking of (please cite) which does not apply here? With all respect, that's 100% bonkers.
      • lxgr 9mo ago
        They don't handle transactions. It's a blockchain-based platform that they design and operate, but part of that design is that they don't hold money themselves, nor are they the arbiter to any of the markets hosted on their platform. > Also, what definition of "invasion" are you thinking of (please cite) which does not apply here? No idea what a better definition of "invasion" could have been, but the only one that's relevant for the resolution is that listed on the market description on Polymarket (which many traders don't even read, but that's a different story).
        • hyperhello 9mo ago
          This argument seems to be about the real meaning of words versus their overloaded legal analogues. I can’t imagine Venezuela’s military kidnapping Trump, then saying they would run the United States now, being parsed like this.
          • lxgr 9mo ago
            That's not my point at all. I'm only saying that your criticism and claims of fraud are probably directed at the wrong entity.
        • cyanydeez 9mo ago
          There is an arbiter tho. That's the point of the article. Unless you tell us who inputs the bits for a bet, you're just spewing chatgpt bable. Someone flips the bits to the bet.
  • nabla9 9mo ago
    That's not what it says.
    • reshlo 9mo ago
      Isn’t it? > This market will resolve to "Yes" if the United States commences a military offensive intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela between November 3, 2025, and January 31, 2026, 11:59 PM ET. Otherwise, this market will resolve to "No".
      • nabla9 9mo ago
        The US attack had no intent to control territory. It was to nab one guy. Second paragraph establishes that after intent, there must be de facto control of the territory. 1. Attack intent to control did not happen. 2. De facto control of Venezuelan territory did not happen.
        • tremon 9mo ago
          Second paragraph establishes that after intent, there must be de facto control of the territory. The way I read it, the second paragraph serves as the definition of territory ("any portion of Venezuela"), not as a condition for resolving the bet. The invasion doesn't need to be successful, it just needs to have the intent you specified in 1. ...which makes the entire bet like quicksand, because it relies on the public statements from a regime known for its "inaccurate" messaging. The more interesting question for rules lawyers is whether the president itself classifies as "any portion of Venezuela" -- the claim doesn't explicitly limit itself to only geographical portions.
        • monocasa 9mo ago
          Kidnapping the president of a country is very clear intent to exert control over a country. The second "de facto" part is about the preconditions of the bet, to define what is Venezuela versus the US.
          • prmoustache 9mo ago
  • watwut 9mo ago
    Why is this downvoted? The argument is solid. USA did not achieved control, but its leadership apparently think they have it.
    • lxgr 9mo ago
      Because it's blaming Polymarket for something not within its control, which is imprecise. TFA makes the same mistake, fwiw.
      • cubefox 9mo ago
        That's a minor flaw but the comment seems mostly correct.
      • JKCalhoun 9mo ago
        It's almost like they were not going to pay up regardless. Might as well have bet "doll hairs"…
        • lxgr 9mo ago
          They are paying up, just for the "no" outcome.
          • hn_acc1 9mo ago
            They ARE, or INTEND to? It's not Jan 31, 2026 yet, so, AFAICT, only the "Yes" option can be short-circuited if it occurs. They can't pay the "No" side until Feb 1, 2026, right?
            • lxgr 9mo ago
              Good point, so for completeness: They'll pay out either "Yes" or "No", but definitely not nobody or themselves (except if they're also "Yes" or "No" holders).
    • lenerdenator 9mo ago
      Depends on what you mean by "achieved control". Is it having heavy influence over through proxies? You can't just snatch a guy like Maduro out of a country without some local help. Help that would presumably be aligned with you on goals. Or is it setting up a complete government like in Iraq, postwar Germany/Japan, etc.?
  • SllX 9mo ago
    There is nothing both public and credible to substantiate the claim by the POTUS. It’s possible we have de facto control of the regime through some backroom that only the Trump Administration knows about, but that’s just speculative on my part. We don’t know this is actually the case, and thus far there hasn’t been anything to substantiate the existence of such a thing. So we’re at at a point where if put on the spot, gun to my head, I had to answer whether the United States controls the Government of Venezuela in any meaningful way, I would have to say “No” despite what Trump himself said. This is subject to change, pending further evidence made available to the American people.
    • reshlo 9mo ago
      It doesn’t matter whether the US actually has control, only that the military action was taken with intent to establish control. >This market will resolve to "Yes" if the United States commences a military offensive intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela between November 3, 2025, and January 31, 2026, 11:59 PM ET. Otherwise, this market will resolve to "No".
      • SllX 9mo ago
        What the military actually did was a raid which captured Maduro and his wife, and likely took out some of Venezuela’s anti-air capabilities—for all the good they did them—in the process. As far as we know, that was the intent. Actually establishing control is an occupational effort. I see your argument, and I think it is even defensible but I think it falls short. An actual resolution to this question may require a judge to weigh in on the contract.
        • hunterpayne 9mo ago
          The Chavez Museum was also destroyed...but no it wasn't an invasion. It didn't control land which is the definition in this case. The blockade provides de facto control which is what Trump is referring to.
          • 9mo ago
  • jcranmer 9mo ago
    The current POTUS is not a credible source.
    • NamlchakKhandro 9mo ago
      [flagged]
    • devwastaken 9mo ago
      Venezuala government calls it an invasion. U.S left with the evidence, do we trust the fascist regime of venezuala or the elected president of the U.S?
      • lxgr 9mo ago
        It seems like it would be common sense to trust neither party to the conflict to arbitrate such markets. That’s why e.g. for presidential election, the criterion is usually a quorum of different news outlets and not either party running.
      • Phelinofist 9mo ago
        > do we trust the fascist regime of venezuala or the fascist president of the U.S? FTFY
    • NewJazz 9mo ago
      On the intent of the US administration?
      • cyanydeez 9mo ago
        Yeah, actually. He's basically a spokesperson. A non credible one. Someone like Stephen Miller is more credible.
      • margalabargala 9mo ago
        Obviously. The things the POTUS says, are intended to further the US Government's goals. The actual statements made may be true or false. If POTUS says "We did X because Y", that's no guarantee that Y is the reason that X was done, or even that X was done at all. That just means that POTUS would like people to think that Y was the reason X was done. That Trump is also a serial liar is not actually relevant here, this is true for every President. They make statements in service of their agenda, not in service of the truth.
  • deleted 9mo ago
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  • zahlman 9mo ago
    It's not as if the site can steal money this way. Either something else happens before the 31st that does meet their definition, or else they have to pay out the "no" side.
  • Bombthecat 9mo ago
    Is the potus a credible source, ( as per definition of the bet)
• thatcat 9mo ago
  This is the whole thing about polymarket, whoever writes the original bet can lawyer it to create a misleading impression of probabilities by defining an overly narrow or vague victory condition that they will interpret to their benefit to make more money.
  • lxgr 9mo ago
    The conditions are public and (as far as I know) immutable, though. Getting language lawyered is part of the risk of taking such bets, which is why it's probably a bad idea for most laypeople to do it, except if they're hedging some other investment or something similar.
    • order-matters 9mo ago
      i think its supposed to be fun and if you get rules lawyered then you get to complain about it and have people agree with you at parties that you should have won the bet i dont think it is intended to be used as a meaningful investment platform, or even a serious gambling establishment like an actual casino. its whole angle is "wouldnt it be funny if you could bet on ____" and then you can
      • thatcat 9mo ago
        Unfortunately, no it's supposed to be a predictive platform that uses market forces to reduce bias.
        • order-matters 9mo ago
          they can pitch themselves however they want, I am thinking along the lines of where I believe it works as a product
    • thatcat 9mo ago
      Yea, but to get an idea of how events will be decided you need to look at similar past bets.
  • 9mo ago
• strangattractor 9mo ago
  Sounds to me like they intend to control the oil production infrastructure which is land/territory within Venezuela - but what do I know. Isn't the entire Polymarket concept rife with ways to abuse the system? If I have insider knowledge I get shills to create a market for that knowledge - then make an extreme bet at the last moment. Seems sort of like betting the 49ers will not win the Super Bowl because you know that Purdy's kneecaps are about to be busted. Or large options trades the day before the Senate votes on Healthcare bills.
  • cyanydeez 9mo ago
    Naive view is it's suppose to create public interest measures with real valued results. Unfortunately, it's pretty easy to see something, eventually, like "X won't be seen in public after December 31st, 2026" essentially creating an assassination market. Basically, boil finance bros down to sociopathy.
  • NedF 9mo ago
    [dead]
  • wiml 9mo ago
    I think it hinges on whether "any part of Venezuela" includes intangible "parts" like being able to tell them who to sell oil to, or whether it only refers to land/territory. The second paragraph implies that control over land is the point of the bet, but it doesn't explicitly say so. Control over the oil industry doesn't require control over land.
    • morshu9001 9mo ago
      It does mention land too. Could be more explicit, but the intent seems clear enough.
    • justinclift 9mo ago
      > Control over the oil industry doesn't require control over land. That may be the case, but the US clearly does have control over the land, as they're literally telling Venezuela what to do with it. That the US skipped a few steps of deploying troops on the same land first doesn't really seem to be here or there.
• croes 9mo ago
  https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/business/energy-environment/us-venezuela-oil-control.html https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/07/business/energy-environme... Sounds pretty much like it
• JumpCrisscross 9mo ago
  The U.S. absolutely “commence[d] a military offensive” against Venezuela. The question said if it “intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela.” The condition is based on intent, not outcome. (It’s a poorly-drafted contract.)
• DannyBee 9mo ago
  This is wrong. It was a helicopter evac. I guarantee you 100% at some point they intended to, and did control, the roof of a building or an area of land for some length of time in order to perform the helicopter evac. I bet they even said so, over the radio. I bet if it's not classified (unclear), you could get the operators to testify to this. Even if it had been a boat evac they would do the same for the boat landing/evac area. There is a 0% chance the planned military operation did not involve deliberately controlling some area, for some length of time, inside venezuela, for exfil. The terms do not require they establish permanent control, or control for any significant length of time. Just that they intend to control, and did control, some area.
  • machomaster 9mo ago
    1. "Establish". Stabilize the control, not temporarily visit. Similar to flying a bit in the airspace does not count as establishing a control. 2. "Establish an area" also means that the area would be big enough and control significant/independent enough in order to maintain (!) it. E.g. imagine if most of the Delta were eliminated and only one guy survived, holding a maid hostage in the toilet. That would not count because the area is small, the control is insignificant and keeping the toilet space was not the original point anyway. Similar as attacking Brazilian servers would not count only because the traffic went through Venezuela's network.
    • DannyBee 9mo ago
      Taking words out of sentences and trying to define them piece by piece rarely makes sense. For example, you forgot the "intended to" part. Especially taking terms about a military operation and appling regular dictionary definitions to them makes little to no sense. For example, in the legal and contract realm, something like establishing control means simply having authority over something, even temporarily. IE statements of the intent to run venezuela would suffice, even without any land control, ability to do so, etc. In practice - a court is going to give it a fairly broad reading consistent with an everyday person's understanding, since that is who is betting. They will additionally rely on public statements about intent, etc. This assumes nobody can get enough information about the actual operational plans. So if the court wanted to interpret "establish control" (which, again, it would not do separately from the other words, but let's say they did), it would do something like the following: 1. Is it defined in the contract? Yes - contract definition controls 2. Is it consistently used in context? Yes - context control 3. Is it a term of art in the field? Yes - definition of term of art controls 4. Is it still ambiguous? Yes - evidence about what it means gets presented by both sides Part 4 is where you'd present a dictionary definition. In any case, there is no point in having this argument, as polymarket's TOS almost certainly allows them to do what they want, and nobody is going to care what random internet commentators who suddenly have turned themselves into full blown lawyers, think :) (In fact, polymarket's terms requires you to agree that they have no control whatsoever over contract resolution, etc. They are also governed by the law of panama)
• atoav 9mo ago
  Wait, how do you exfiltrate a head of state without establishing some level of control for even the briefest of periods?
• testing22321 9mo ago
  >This market will resolve to "Yes" if the United States commences a military offensive intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela between November 3, 2025, and January 31, 2026, 11:59 PM ET. Otherwise, this market will resolve to "No". “We will run the country, yes” - Trump
• dragonwriter 9mo ago
  > This market will resolve to "Yes" if the United States commences a military offensive intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela between November 3, 2025, and January 31, 2026, There are two conditions: (1) A military offensive: obviously satisfied, and (2) That military offensive being intended to establish control over any portion of Venezuela: The President explicitly stated that the intended outcome was that US would run the country, and that, if it was necessary to use additional military force beyond the original act to secure that because of the lack of cooperation of the remnants of the regime left in Venezuela, that additional force would be applied. So, that part is also satisfied. Any denial that the conditions were satisfied is pure sophistry.
  • deleted 9mo ago
    [deleted]