A wallet created only days ago reportedly turned around $4 million into nearly $9 million in profit by betting against Spain, sparking debate among on-chain analysts over whether the trade was lucky timing or based on non-public information.
In a major World Cup surprise, debutants Cabo Verde held tournament favorites Spain to a 0–0 draw on Monday, triggering outsized payouts for bettors who had priced in a dominant Spain win, with pre-match odds near 1:10 against the underdogs.
The result produced two of the most extreme outcomes seen on Polymarket this tournament. Data reviewed by CoinDesk shows a newly created wallet generated over $9 million in profit within hours after starting with about $4 million. At the same time, another trader lost close to $1 million on a position that would have paid only around $85,000 had Spain won.
Cabo Verde, making its first World Cup appearance with a relatively unknown squad, faced a Spain team widely considered one of the title favorites and reigning European champions. Veteran goalkeeper Vozinha, aged 40, was named player of the match after a standout performance.
On-chain analytics firm Lookonchain identified the winning wallet, “fishalive,” which was created this month. It placed two key bearish positions: one betting Spain would not win outright, and another on Cabo Verde covering a +2.5 goal spread.
Both trades paid out after the 0–0 result, with public records showing roughly $4.7 million in gains from the outright market and $8.5 million from the spread, producing a single-day profit of about $9 million.
On the losing side, a trader known as “betoor619” lost nearly $1 million after betting on a Spain victory when the market implied a 92% probability. If Spain had won, the payout would have been only about $85,000, reflecting the low reward structure of heavily favored bets.
That account’s history reportedly shows no previous trade exceeding gains or losses of $9,000, highlighting the unusual scale of the outcome.
Polymarket is a prediction market platform where users trade shares tied to real-world events, with prices reflecting implied probabilities and settlements conducted in USDC on-chain.
Because trading occurs through crypto wallets without identity verification, users operate pseudonymously, a structure that has drawn regulatory criticism compared with traditional sportsbooks that collect customer information.
The Spain match alone saw around $64 million in volume, while Polymarket’s World Cup market has reached roughly $2.4 billion, surpassing activity from this year’s Super Bowl and trailing only major political cycles such as last year’s U.S. election.
While blockchain transparency allows all trades to be publicly tracked, it does not reveal identity, meaning observers could watch the “fishalive” wallet rapidly scale its capital in real time without knowing who was behind it.
That anonymity, combined with the size and precision of the trade, has turned the wallet into one of the most closely watched accounts on the platform.
