The prediction market platform, which is not licensed in the UK and geoblocks British users, has been recruiting UK content creators to promote its product during the FIFA World Cup — with most posts carrying no advertising disclosure.
Polymarket has been exposed for targeting UK social media influencers to market its platform on X, with multiple creators found to have shared promotional content relating to the prediction market without any disclosure of a paid relationship. The story broke today after Ellis Platten — a football content creator with 635,000 subscribers on his AwayDays YouTube channel — published a screenshot of an outreach email he had received from a company claiming to represent Polymarket, offering him payment to quote tweet content from the platform’s @PolymarketSport account in connection with the FIFA World Cup.
The email read:
“Hi Ellis, I am reaching out because we are partnering with Polymarket on all partnerships across social media channels. They are interested in your X account for the upcoming World Cup. This would focus on quote tweets.”
Platten declined the approach and called it out publicly. “Didn’t realise how prevalent this actually was when I tweeted this,” he subsequently wrote. “Basically, if you see any person or account with any sort of following sharing anything related to Polymarket, they’re being paid to advertise them. Highly shady, highly illegal if they’re not disclosing it.”
A Pattern of Undisclosed Influencer Activity
The UK campaign is the latest manifestation of a promotional strategy that has drawn significant scrutiny at an international level. A POLITICO investigation published on June 5 revealed that Polymarket’s chief marketing officer, Matthew Modabber, used his personal PayPal account to transfer more than $2.5 million to over 800 people between January 2025 and February 2026. At least $350,000 of that went directly to roughly two dozen influencers and content creators, tasked with making Polymarket odds appear as organic, newsworthy content on X. The 490 posts generated by the arrangement — by the POLITICO investigation’s count — were framed using terms such as “BREAKING” and “NEW,” and none carried any disclosure of a paid relationship.
A Polymarket spokesperson told POLITICO that working with influencers was part of the company’s routine business activities but declined to comment on disclosure practices or on Modabber’s use of a personal account to process the payments.
Former Federal Trade Commission (FTC) deputy general counsel Robin Moore told POLITICO the arrangement appeared to be the kind of relationship that should generally be disclosed. The Federal Trade Commission requires influencers operating in the US to disclose material connections when endorsing products or services.
The UK outreach targeting Platten and others appears to be a continuation of that model, applied to a market where Polymarket has no regulatory standing whatsoever.
A Platform With No UK Licence and a Deliberate Geoblock
The regulatory context in the UK makes the influencer campaign particularly significant. Polymarket is not licensed by the UK Gambling Commission and does not hold authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority. The platform voluntarily geoblocks UK IP addresses — meaning British users cannot access Polymarket even if they attempt to do so directly. The Gambling Commission has indicated that prediction market products of Polymarket’s type would likely fall within the definition of a “Betting Intermediary” under existing UK legislation, and formal guidance is expected before the end of 2026.
The FCA’s permanent ban on binary options — financial instruments that settle at either zero or one, which mirrors how Polymarket contracts function — has been in force since April 2019. Promoting such products to UK retail consumers without authorisation constitutes a criminal offence under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000.
Running influencer marketing campaigns directed at UK audiences without disclosing the commercial relationship adds a further layer of regulatory risk, entirely separately from the platform’s licensing position.
The ASA Framework and Industry Context
Under Advertising Standards Authority rules, all parties in the advertising supply chain — brands, agencies, and influencers — share responsibility for the clear and immediate disclosure of paid content. The ASA requires that advertising be “clearly and obviously distinguished” from organic content. Using platforms’ built-in disclosure tools or labelling posts with “Ad” or “#ad” at the outset is mandatory; disclosure buried in a bio or at the end of a caption does not meet the standard. Finance and gambling receive the highest level of regulatory scrutiny under the ASA’s framework, and the regulator has signalled it will apply targeted sanctions for repeated breaches.
Several UK creators spotted quote tweeting @PolymarketSport posts subsequently deleted that content after Platten’s disclosure went public. Some posts that remain visible have since been labelled as paid partnerships, though others carry no labelling at all.
The case draws an immediate comparison to the regulatory fate of Stake in the UK. The crypto sportsbook exited the Great Britain market in May 2025 following a period in which its branding appeared across social media content in formats that breached ASA rules on disclosure, with one high-profile incident involving an adult content creator proving the final trigger for its departure.
The UK’s Illegal Gambling Taskforce has been focused on clamping down on undisclosed marketing activity from unlicensed operators. The ASA has been contacted for comment. Polymarket has not responded publicly to the UK-specific disclosures.