A Polymarket trader who made about $1 million on Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League last Wednesday lost about $1.13 million on Sunday, Nov. 8, after backing Manchester United against Aston Villa and betting against Barcelona at Atlético Madrid. United’s game ended in a 4-4 goalfest, with the Red Devils coming back from two goals down in stoppage time but unable to complete the full comeback.
Key Takeaways
A Stoppage-Time Comeback Wasn’t Enough for United
In 21 trades between 16:06 and 16:30 UTC on Sunday, the scheduled kickoff time, the account totoro3miyazaki bought 1,633,345 shares in Manchester United to win at 48 to 49 cents each, spending about $818,300 including fees, according to its Polymarket profile. Polymarket had United as 48.5% favorites just before kickoff, with Villa at 28.5% and a draw at 23.5%.
Aston Villa scored twice in the first four minutes, and United were level by halftime after a penalty in the 16th minute and a goal in the 44th. Villa went 4-2 up with goals in the 48th and 53rd minutes, and United’s price fell below 1 cent late in the game, with a draw at just over 1 cent. United then scored in the second and sixth minutes of stoppage time to draw 4-4, a result that did not materially change the account’s win position, netting a loss of $818,286.
That evening, the account bet against Barcelona at Atlético Madrid, buying 591,602 “No” shares on a Barcelona win for about $297,800. Almost all of it, $290,730, went in at 49 cents before the 20:00 UTC kickoff, when Polymarket gave Barcelona a 50.5% chance to win, with about $7,100 more added at 55 cents during the game. Giuliano Simeone put Atlético ahead in the 10th minute, but Fermín López scored twice for a 2-1 Barcelona win, costing the account $297,792.
A smaller bet against Bournemouth, who won 2-1 at Ipswich Town, lost $11,050, bringing Sunday’s total to a negative $1,127,128.
Four Days After a $1 Million Dortmund Win
The losses wiped out a seven-figure win from earlier in the week. On Wednesday, Nov. 4, the same account bought 2,888,680 Dortmund shares for $1,886,142 in the 10 minutes before the 20:00 UTC kickoff against Real Betis, paying an average of 65.3 cents including fees. Dortmund won 2-1 in the Champions League, and the position made $1,002,563, according to Polymarket data.
The account’s record shows similar swings throughout its lifespan. It made about $1.61 million on Brentford’s win over Chelsea in September, $951,471 betting against Chelsea and $661,764 on Brentford, but lost $977,996 backing Celta Vigo and $771,207 betting against Como. After Sunday, Polymarket’s leaderboard data puts its all-time result at a loss of about $338,000 on almost $34 million in trading volume. The account held about $204,000 in an unresolved position on Monday.
Another Chelsea Bet Goes Wrong
Totoro3miyazaki was not the only large Polymarket soccer trader to lose on Sunday: the account joseph00677, which lost $1.62 million on Chelsea against Tottenham on Oct. 24, bought 4,105,417 Chelsea shares at an average of 50.7 cents between 09:58 and 10:23 UTC on Sunday, hours before the 14:00 UTC kickoff at Sunderland. By kickoff, Chelsea’s price had slipped to 41.5 cents. Sunderland won 1-0, and joseph00677 lost $2,132,460.
Single-game bets of this size have become common on Polymarket’s sports markets, from a $500,000 Seahawks-Broncos face-off in October to this weekend’s seven-figure soccer losses. The gaming industry has made a similar argument about Polymarket’s rival Kalshi in court: in an amicus brief filed Nov. 6 in Kalshi’s Second Circuit appeal against New York, the American Gaming Association argued that the exchange offers “garden-variety sports bets.”
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WRITTEN BYLuci KelemenWriter
