P2P.me, a stablecoin startup, has admitted that it placed bets on the outcome of its own fundraising on Polymarket, setting off criticism over insider trading and market manipulation risks. The profit was less than $15,000, but the trades were funded through a project foundation account, not a personal wallet.
In a public apology on X, P2P.me said the trades were an improper attempt to signal confidence to the public. The issue quickly widened beyond the size of the gain. Reports said key backers including Coinbase Ventures and Multicoin Capital were unaware of the activity, and some major shareholders did not know the company had been betting on an event directly tied to its own financing.
Bets centered on MetaDAO fundraising thresholds
The positions were tied to MetaDAO, a Solana ecosystem fundraising and governance platform. Some bets referenced a scenario in which P2P.me would secure $140 million in commitments through MetaDAO, but the position that actually produced gains was linked to a $6 million milestone.
On-chain records show the company used a Polymarket account called “P2P Team” and placed 27 bets in total. Unchained reported that the campaign involved $20,500 in capital and returned $35,212, for roughly $14,700 in net profit. The largest single win was $8,173 in January, when the account bet that another MetaDAO project would fail to raise $100 million.
The timing drew scrutiny. The positions were established 10 days before the public fundraising event went live. At that stage, P2P.me had said it only had a $3 million verbal commitment from Multicoin Capital rather than a binding agreement. In the end, the MetaDAO raise brought in about $5.2 million, below the $6 million target, and the contract resolved to “No.”
Backers were unaware, and on-chain observers surfaced the trades first
Decrypt cited sources saying P2P.me’s main investors did not know about the trading activity. A spokesperson for Coinbase Ventures said the firm did not make any follow-on investment beyond the initial seed round. That seed round had raised $2 million, led by Coinbase Ventures and Multicoin Capital.
The matter did not emerge through a full voluntary disclosure from the company. According to Unchained, community researchers first identified the on-chain activity and made it public, after which P2P.me responded. Multicoin and Polymarket did not respond to Decrypt’s requests for comment.
MetaDAO offered refunds as P2P.me returned profits and closed positions
MetaDAO co-founder Prohp3t, who remains anonymous, said the platform would have discouraged the plan if it had known P2P.me intended to bet on Polymarket. He said he did not agree with the move and compared it to a marketing stunt that went too far.
MetaDAO said it would offer refunds to investors who wanted to exit before P2P.me’s public raise closed on Tuesday. Data obtained by Decrypt showed that out of $6.7 million in total commitments, about $20,000 in refund requests had been submitted so far.
Follow-up reports from CoinTelegraph and crypto.news said P2P.me had taken three corrective steps: returning all profits to the MetaDAO treasury, exiting all Polymarket positions, and drafting a formal policy for prediction-market trading.
Rule changes arrived late as lawmakers advanced the PREDICT Act
Two days before the MetaDAO fundraising event launched on March 25, Polymarket updated its rules to ban trading by people holding positions or influence sufficient to affect the outcome of an event. But the company’s bets had been opened before that rule change, leaving an awkward gap around how the conduct should be judged under platform policy.
Pressure from lawmakers was building at the same time. Crypto.news reported that Representatives Adrian Smith and Nikki Budzinski introduced the PREDICT Act on March 25, aiming to bar members of Congress and senior federal officials from trading on prediction markets. California has already passed a state-level measure banning state officials from using insider information to bet on platforms such as Polymarket and Kalshi.
In its statement, P2P.me said it had created confusion and damaged trust. Unchained also reported that Polymarket has partnered with data analytics firm Palantir to build a market-manipulation monitoring system designed to detect unusual betting patterns.