The Globe and Mail reports in its Thursday edition that prediction markets are dominated by sophisticated users who capture nearly all of the profits, with most retail players losing. The Globe's Meera Raman writes that a working paper that analyzed trades on the popular U.S.-based prediction market platform Polymarket found 71 per cent of users lose money, while a small group of skilled traders reap more than 80 per cent of all gains. The paper analyzed more than 1.4 million users and $20-billion (U.S.) in volume across 70 million trades on Polymarket between 2022 and 2025. The research was conducted by scholars from HEC Montreal, the University of Toronto and ESSEC Business School in Cergy, France. "Unless you're very lucky or extremely good at forecasting, your expectation of making money is zero," said Charles Martineau at the U of T. Prediction markets have been met with scrutiny in the U.S., where lawmakers and regulators are debating whether these products are gambling. In Canada, prediction trading products have largely been off limits, although regulators, led by the Ontario Securities Commission, have recently begun allowing limited offerings. Wealthsimple has approval to offer so-called forecast contracts.