Glossary
Resolution / UMA oracle
How Polymarket finalizes most news and politics markets: a proposal, a liveness window, optional dispute, then winning shares redeem $1.
Polymarket does not “decide” most political and news markets in-house. Resolution goes through UMA’s optimistic oracle: someone proposes an outcome, a liveness window runs, and anyone can dispute with a bond if the proposal contradicts the market’s written rules. If nobody disputes, the proposal becomes the official result and winning shares redeem at $1.
That is slower and more legalistic than a sports feed. The question text, the listed resolution source, and the cutoff time in the rules are the contract. A tweet that “everyone knows” is not enough if the source is a government page that has not updated. Disputes move the question to a vote; they are rare on liquid books and messy when they happen. Until the oracle finalizes, last price is a quote under unfinished rules — not cash.
Polydata’s resolved pages show who made or lost money after settlement, not during the dispute window. The oracle leaderboard is a separate product: trader accuracy over time. It is not the UMA mechanism. After finalization, settlement is mechanical: winners to $1, losers to $0, USDC back to the wallet. If a market is still in liveness, treat residual tape as dispute risk, not a new thesis.