Polymarket on Wednesday added deposit limits and self-exclusion from 30 days to life, while sports and parlays reportedly made up more than 98% of September volume on its U.S. site.
Key Points:
- Traders can lock themselves out for 30 days, one year or permanently, and U.S. users can cap deposits by day, week or month.
- The platform partnered with Birches Health, which offers virtual addiction treatment in all 50 states.
- A gambling policy analyst says few bettors use similar tools at sportsbooks, and key enforcement details remain unanswered.
Polymarket Self-Exclusion Rules
The prediction market operator unveiled the tools in a company statement, alongside plans to expand its trust and safety team across its U.S. and international platforms.
Traders can now voluntarily exclude themselves for 30 days, one year or a lifetime. Users opt in to each measure.
U.S. users can also set daily, weekly or monthly deposit limits across all funding methods, which include Apple Pay, bank transfers, cards and cryptocurrency. Lowering a limit takes effect immediately, while raising or removing one requires a cooling-off period whose length the statement did not specify.
Polymarket also partnered with Birches Health, a provider of virtual addiction treatment in all 50 states. The platform will surface those resources inside the product and through customer support for users showing signs of compulsive trading. A new Trust & Safety Center gathers its rules and moderation standards in one place.
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Cohen, Kirschner On Sportsbook Parallels
Sports and multi-leg parlays accounted for more than 98% of September trading volume on Polymarket's U.S. site, according to data firm TickerTracker. That overlap helps explain why the tools resemble safeguards that state laws require of licensed sportsbooks, even though prediction markets answer to the federal CFTC and face no such mandate.
Jonathan Cohen, who leads gambling policy at the American Institute for Boys and Men, said the impact may be limited because state regulator data show few gamblers use similar tools at sportsbooks. Gaming lawyer Joshua Kirschner called the protections good for consumers but also "a nod to try to pacify state regulators." Polymarket deputy chief legal officer Olivia Chalos acknowledged the similarities but said the company runs a different business model.
Malea Otranto, Polymarket's global head of trust and safety, called the launch "the floor, not the ceiling" and said the company will track usage and may adjust the tools. Polymarket has not explained whether self-exclusion extends to linked accounts and wallets, or whether users must pay for treatment themselves.
Letitia James Polymarket Lawsuit
New York Attorney General Letitia James sued Polymarket's U.S. operator on Sept. 24, seeking a court order to stop what the state calls an unlicensed gambling business. Polymarket denied wrongdoing and filed a federal countersuit within hours. Her office brought similar cases against Coinbase and Gemini in April and Kalshi in July, and a bipartisan coalition of 44 states has argued in court that prediction platforms should be regulated like gambling.
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