It took Polymarket less than 24 hours to turn a Middle Eastern war into an active trading floor. Since the U.S. and Israel launched strikes on Iran Saturday, the prediction market has seen a flood of new contracts covering everything from ceasefire timelines to whether the Iranian regime will collapse by June.
$45M Market Settles on Khamenei's Death; Top Trader Nets $757K
Polymarket's largest completed market — "Khamenei out as Supreme Leader of Iran by March 31?" — resolved to 100% after Iranian state TV confirmed his death on Saturday. The contract pulled $45 million in volume, making it one of the most-traded geopolitical markets in the past week. The top trader, an account called "Curseaaaaaaa," made $757,000 on a "yes" bet. Four other traders each cleared six figures. The chart on that market hovered between 25% and 50% through January and February as tensions built, then spiked vertically to 100% when confirmation came through.
$529M Behemoth: U.S. Strike Contract Becomes Polymarket's Fourth-Largest Ever
The biggest market, however, is the "US strikes Iran by...?" contract, which has been live since December 22 and has now pulled $529 million in total volume, making it one of the largest single markets Polymarket has ever hosted. That figure makes it the largest market in Polymarket's "World" and "Geopolitics" categories by a wide margin, and the fourth-largest in the broader "Politics" category behind only Trump-related contracts from the 2024 election cycle. The February 28 date alone attracted $89.6 million in trading. Every daily contract from February 28 through early March resolved to "yes" after the strikes began, meaning anyone who bought the specific date before the attack collected on a binary bet about when the U.S. military would bomb another country. The market's resolution rules were precise: it required drone, missile, or air strikes on Iranian soil by U.S. forces, with interceptions, cyberattacks, and ground operations not counting.
What's Next: Ceasefire Odds, Regime Collapse, and Bitcoin's Bounce
Now the trading action has shifted to what comes next. The ceasefire market gives just a 4% chance of a U.S.-Iran ceasefire by March 2 and 15% by March 6, but jumps to 61% by March 31 and 78% by April 30. Bettors are pricing a resolution within weeks, not months, consistent with bitcoin's bounce to $68,000 on the same thesis. "Will the Iranian regime fall by June 30?" sits at 54%, up sharply from the low-20s where it had traded for months. The "Next Supreme Leader of Iran" market gives a 30% chance to "position abolished" entirely, meaning bettors see nearly a one-in-three shot that the theocratic structure itself doesn't survive. Ali Larijani, a former parliament speaker, leads the named candidates at 21%.