US strategic bitcoin reserve
The order created the reserve. The market still resolved No, because seized coins did not count.
The title said
Will Trump create a national bitcoin reserve in his first 100 days?
The rules said
Polymarket's rule read wide, then narrowed in a footnote. Yes if the US government held any amount of bitcoin in its reserves inside the window, with one carve-out: the US government confiscating bitcoin does not count as holding bitcoin reserves. Kalshi's version of the same question asked for a designated national reserve comparable to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, over a different window and off a different source list.
What happened
An executive order on 6 March 2025 created a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, capitalised with bitcoin the government already held, most of it forfeited. Polymarket's 100-days market, which traded about $23m, resolved No. Its separate 2025 market resolved No too. Yes holders argued the reserve plainly existed. The carve-out said the coins inside it did not count.
The lesson
A price gap between venues is only free money if the trigger, the source and the deadline are identical. Usually one of them is not.
What our card would have shown
- R2Rules don't say what counts as done
- R7A specific counterparty is named
Sources
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