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Polymarket US has opened five-minute up-or-down contracts on Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and XRP, bringing the shortest duration yet to its US prediction app. According to Coinpedia, the contracts are binary forecasts in which a correct call pays out $1 per contract.
The launch lands on the CFTC-regulated operation Polymarket built around QCX LLC, the licensed derivatives exchange it bought in July 2025. Cryptobriefing reported that the new markets were announced on October 27, 2026, and sit inside an app that is available in most states.
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Key facts
- Four assets are covered: BTC, ETH, SOL and XRP, each as a yes-or-no question on whether price ends the five-minute window higher or lower than it started.
- Settlement relies on Chainlink’s 60-second time-weighted average price (TWAP); Coinpedia reported that ties resolve automatically to the up position.
- Cryptobriefing reported the TWAP settlement rule has applied since August 14, 2026.
- Polymarket US added 15-minute, hourly and daily contracts on October 15, 2026, twelve days before the five-minute window arrived for all four tokens, per Cryptobriefing.
- Polymarket acquired QCX LLC in a $112 million deal in July 2025, after being fined $1.4 million and forced out of the US market following its 2020 launch, Coinpedia reported.
How the contracts resolve
Each market poses a single direction question, and users buy shares on the outcome they expect. Correct shares pay out; incorrect ones do not. Settlement is automated through Chainlink, the oracle network that feeds outside price data into blockchain applications.
Polymarket’s stated reason for using a 60-second average rather than an exchange spot price is that averaging raises the cost of manipulating the last seconds before a window closes. Cryptobriefing noted the method does not make manipulation impossible, but makes the result harder to hijack with one well-timed order.
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The format was not new to the platform: Cryptobriefing reported that Polymarket first introduced a five-minute Bitcoin market in February 2026 and has revised the settlement mechanics since. The US app runs separately from Polymarket.com, the international arm.
Competition is the constraint
Coinpedia reported that Polymarket dominates the global events market while Kalshi leads on US consumer volume, a gap the outlet attributes to Kalshi’s legal 2020 launch and its institutional tie-ups with Robinhood, Coinbase and Webull. Polymarket’s US contracts lean toward crypto and pop-culture events, and the beta app is currently invite-only.
Both platforms are federally regulated by the CFTC, but state-level resistance persists. Coinpedia reported that Nevada and Minnesota have blocked all prediction market platforms, Washington and Michigan have banned sports-related contracts, and New York, Texas and California are contesting operations.
The reports differ in emphasis on timing: Coinpedia dated its article at 00:30 UTC on October 28, 2026, while Cryptobriefing dated the announcement to October 27, 2026.
Why it matters
Shorter contracts pull prediction markets closer to high-frequency trading, where the settlement feed matters more than the trade idea. A five-minute window leaves little room to react, so the Chainlink TWAP rule becomes the central practical detail for anyone deciding whether to participate. The expansion also shows Polymarket building volume through product cadence in the US while state bans and court challenges limit where it can operate.
What to watch
Two things will shape the next phase: whether the invite-only, stand-alone US app opens to broader access, and how state contests in New York, Texas and California resolve. Any change to the Chainlink settlement methodology is also worth tracking, given how directly it sets outcomes on such short windows. This article is not financial advice, and crypto markets are volatile and uncertain.
Sources: Coinpedia, Cryptobriefing
