Polymarket’s post-CFTC corporate cleanup has a Panama-shaped hole in it. Former employees told WIRED that Adventure One QSS, the Panama entity set up to run Polymarket’s offshore prediction-market platform after a 2022 federal settlement, had staff working from the United States, including New York.
The arrangement matters because the Commodity Futures Trading Commission had already said Polymarket was operating an unlicensed derivatives exchange. In 2022, the agency fined Blockratize, a corporate entity tied to Polymarket, $1.4 million and required it to wind down markets that violated the Commodity Exchange Act. The settlement also required the company to stop violating CFTC rules.
Sportico first reported that Adventure One QSS was created in Panama before the ban on serving US customers. The offshore company took operational responsibility for Polymarket’s main platform. A separate US business, Polymarket US, was later created in 2025 and is overseen by QCX LLC. According to WIRED, Polymarket US is the only Polymarket platform allowed to serve US customers.
Former Polymarket employees told WIRED that some Adventure One QSS workers lived in New York and some worked from Polymarket’s Manhattan headquarters. They said those employees did not travel to Panama, report to Panama-based managers, or work with Panama-based colleagues. The reason, according to those former employees, was prosaic: there were no such colleagues there.
NPR previously reported that Adventure One QSS’s listed headquarters in a Panama City skyscraper appeared empty and that the company had no Panama-based staff. WIRED’s reporting adds the operational detail: former employees said workers handling code, event contracts, and other tasks for the offshore platform were technically assigned to Adventure One QSS, while sitting inside or near the US operation.
The corporate paperwork does include Panama names. Sportico reported that Adventure One QSS’s 2021 incorporation documents listed Panama residents, including lawyer Mario Ernesto García de Paredes as resident agent. Diana Munoz was listed as president for two months before Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan, who is based in New York, replaced her. Omar Camargo, who appears to be based in Panama, was listed as secretary. WIRED said García de Paredes did not respond to requests for comment, while Munoz and Camargo could not be reached.
The structure was not entirely fictional on paper. WIRED reported that Blockratize and Adventure One QSS were not fully merged. Intercontinental Exchange, the parent of the New York Stock Exchange, announced an investment of up to $2 billion in Polymarket, but the investment went into Blockratize rather than Adventure One QSS. Former employees also said Adventure One staff in the US did not have permanent desks in the New York office.
Former CFTC officials told WIRED that staff location could matter. Joseph Konizeski, a former chief trial attorney in the CFTC’s enforcement division, said Polymarket would have needed to move corporate infrastructure offshore, hire offshore staff, and stop taking money from US customers to comply with the settlement. Another former CFTC lawyer told WIRED the agency would have wanted to know if people described as being in Panama were not actually there.
The CFTC declined WIRED’s request for comment on whether Adventure One QSS’s setup complies with the settlement. Polymarket also declined to comment. The CFTC has not accused Adventure One QSS of wrongdoing, and WIRED reported that it is unclear whether the agency would object to the New York staffing arrangement now.
The agency has brought cases before against companies it said claimed to be offshore while operating from the US, including a 2021 complaint involving WorldWideMarkets. More recently, the CFTC dropped a Polymarket investigation in July 2025 without charges. WIRED also reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that a separate CFTC investigation into Polymarket is ongoing after Wall Street Journal reporting on the company’s affiliate marketing practices.
This story draws on original reporting from WIRED.
