Indonesia blocks Polymarket, citing online gambling laws

Indonesia has blocked the prediction market platform Polymarket as it views it as an illegal online gambling service. 

This was made known on Friday, May 22, by the country’s communications and digital ministry, and it also comes a few days after the site opened a wager on whether Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto would leave office before his term expires in 2029.

Did Indonesia ban Polymarket?

Ministry official Alexander Sabar said in a statement that Polymarket’s activities violate Indonesian law as they “contain betting and speculation over events that are inconclusive.”

Gambling is illegal in the country, and authorities have been cracking down on online betting operations.

While the country’s stance on gambling is known, the timing for the ban is not coincidental, as a Polymarket contract asking when Prabowo would be “out as president” appeared on May 21. This was one day after Prabowo unveiled a plan to centralize government control over Indonesia’s most valuable commodity exports, including coal and palm oil.

Investors have been scrutinizing Prabowo’s economic policies throughout 2025 and 2026, and the bet drew attention on Indonesian social media.

Sabar said the government was also reviewing all social media accounts affiliated with Polymarket, according to Reuters.

Which other countries have blocked Polymarket?

The ban puts Indonesia alongside more than 30 countries that have restricted or blocked Polymarket. The Netherlands imposed a penalty order in February 2026 through its gambling authority, the Ksa, threatening fines of up to 420,000 euros per week if Polymarket continued serving Dutch users.

Ksa director Ella Seijsener stated that prediction markets “offer bets that are not permitted in our market under any circumstances, not even by license holders.”

Brazil also banned 27 prediction platforms outright, including the Polymarket and rival Kalshi.

The Brazilian National Monetary Council classified event-based contracts on politics, sports, and cultural outcomes as derivatives that fall outside authorized financial activity.

In January 2026, Ukraine restricted access to Polymarket after the platform hosted bets on the Russian-Ukrainian war, including contracts on the timing of city occupations in Donbas.

Polymarket processed over $270 million in Ukraine-related wagers in December 2025 alone. Portugal, France, Belgium, Romania, Singapore, Thailand, and several U.S. states have also taken enforcement action on Polymarket and Kalshi.

On Polymarket, the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Russia, and others are on the list of blocked countries in its own documentation. Some jurisdictions are limited to closing existing positions and cannot open new ones.

Are prediction markets gambling operations?

Prediction market operators, including Polymarket and its main competitor Kalshi, say their products are financial instruments, not wagers.

However, regulators in countries where they have been banned have applied their existing gambling laws to prediction markets and are treating staked money on uncertain real-world outcomes as betting without consideration for the technology behind them.

In the US, prediction markets have received support from the regulatory body, in this case, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), which withdrew a 2024 proposal that would have banned contracts on elections and sports. Now the CFTC permits trading on authorized platforms under a regulated framework.

Polymarket’s scale makes it a target

Polymarket remains the second-largest prediction market by total value locked at $456 million, despite the regulatory pressures across various jurisdictions, trailing only Kalshi at $1.38 billion, according to DeFiLlama data. The platform processed $3.78 billion in trading volume over the past 30 days and generated $19.95 million in revenue over the same period.

The platform has raised $2.88 billion in total funding, including a $2 billion strategic investment from Intercontinental Exchange in October 2025 and a $600 million round in March 2026.

Polymarket is still bullish on global expansion despite the recent setbacks, as it recently appointed a representative in Japan, and it looks to get government approval in the country by 2030.

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