#预测市场 Seeing this discussion about prediction market manipulation, the first thought that flashed through my mind was—these concerns have been around for a long time. Looking back at history, in 1905 the Washington Post was already shouting about gambling market manipulation; in the 1916 presidential election, Democrats claimed the market was "manipulated"; in 2012, that mysterious large order on InTrade; and now in 2024, the French investor controversy on Polymarket… The patterns have remained the same for decades, just in a different shell.

What truly alarms me is not how easy it is to manipulate—the research by Rhode and Strumpf has long proven that long-term market manipulation is costly and quickly countered by arbitrage trading. The problem lies elsewhere. When prediction market prices start being broadcast nonstop by major media like CNN, when voters can’t judge independently and blindly rely on market signals, and when any abnormal fluctuation is easily interpreted as "foreign interference" or "elite collusion"—that’s the real danger. It’s not the market itself being manipulated, but the trust system being torn apart.

What I see is a familiar pattern: every new tool goes through a cycle from idealization to misuse. Prediction markets, in an era saturated with AI and failing polls, should be a savior—they can aggregate dispersed information with real financial incentives. But connecting them to social media and television news amplifiers makes everything dangerous. Small price fluctuations can become big news; unnecessary panic can overshadow actual impact. History tells me this isn’t a question of "maybe it will happen," but "when it will happen."

The good news is that there are remedies. Liquidity standards, trading monitoring, price transparency, more humble interpretations of market anomalies—these are all feasible. The key is that broadcasting organizations need to think long-term and only report on markets with sufficient liquidity; platforms must establish real monitoring capabilities; policymakers need to clearly declare manipulation as illegal. But honestly, I remain skeptical about the enforcement of these suggestions. Once media discover that market volatility can attract eyeballs, interests kick in. We’ve seen too many stories like this—technology itself isn’t the problem, but human nature can corrupt it.