According to a study cited by Cinco Días, 70.8% of users of the betting platform Polymarket lose money. At the other extreme, 0.1% concentrate 58.5% of the winnings and 1% accumulate 84.1%. Many enter thinking they are participating in an intelligent market. Very few take home almost all the money.Polymarket presents itself as a prediction market. Its users bet on future events: elections, judicial decisions, inflation, sports results, political appointments, or military conflicts.Betting on whether a footballer will score a goal, well, that's fine. But betting on whether the United States will launch missiles against Iran, honestly, I don't understand it. Even less so on a legalized platform.Its defenders use a fallacious argument. They claim that thousands of people, incentivized with real money, incorporate data, analyses, and intuitions. And that, thanks to this, the sum of all these bets results in a form of collective intelligence faster and more precise than any news or official communication from a public or corporate body.Let's see, betting on who will win an election already poses dilemmas. Betting on whether one country will bomb another opens the doors to immorality. Furthermore, leaked or insider information is an opaque advantage that turns into money.The U.S. Department of Justice announced charges on April 23, 2026, against a U.S. soldier accused of using classified information to earn over $400,000 on Polymarket through bets related to the military operation to capture Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela.There were also suspicions surrounding bets linked to attacks against Iran. Several newly created accounts on Polymarket reportedly won around $1.2 million after betting, shortly before, that the United States would attack Iran before February 28, 2026.A market can be technically sophisticated and morally miserable. It can produce useful information and, at the same time, incentivize repugnant behavior. It can be called prediction, investment or financial innovation. But when someone makes money because other people will be bombed, captured or murdered, the word market falls short.What collective intelligence are we talking about? I would speak more of collective immorality. War already generates too many indirect benefits. Turning its probability or calendar into a direct bet goes beyond obscenity. The tragedy of others begins to have a price. Pain transforms into contract. And death, into an opportunity for profitability through gambling.How disgusting.

The war in Iran has raised alarms about the role of betting platforms in relation to the United States administration and the circle of President Donald Trump. According to various North American media outlets, anonymous accounts created shortly before the military interventions in Iran and Venezuela have fueled suspicions of possible insider trading –or even classified information– by government members or Trump's allies and family members.

Sports betting, cards, and roulette are the most common forms of gambling among young Catalans, especially boys. In fact, it is increasingly common for secondary school students, that is, teenagers between 14 and 18 years old, to gamble. Last year, for example, 17% of students participated in in-person gambling, although the percentage among boys rises to 24.5% due to the marked gender gap observed in this practice. This is one of the key findings of the latest survey on drug use in secondary education (ESTUDES), conducted by the Catalan Health Department to understand the consumption habits and addictive behaviors of young Catalans.

The Ministry of Social Rights, Consumer Affairs and Agenda 2030 has fined 32 gambling operators over €33 million, including very serious penalties for six foreign companies operating without a license in Spain, whose websites have been blocked. In total, these six unlicensed operators have received very serious fines exceeding €30 million. Furthermore, the ministry has imposed another 26 serious penalties totaling €3 million for various violations of gambling regulations, as reported by the ministry itself in a statement on Tuesday. This latter group includes companies such as Betfair, 888 Online, and Codere. For example, 888 Online will have to pay a €250,000 fine for failing to meet the technical requirements for its software and communication systems and for using non-approved technical systems. Beatya Online has been fined €300,000 for a similar situation, and Betfair will have to pay €100,000 for a penalty related to non-compliance with player protection and responsible gambling regulations. Electraworks Ceuta has been fined €512,000 for allowing access to gambling for prohibited individuals, using unauthorized or unapproved technical systems, and for non-compliance with software technical requirements. This last reason also affects Codere, which has received a penalty of €17,500. €30 million among six companies

The operators whose websites have been shut down for operating without a license are XYZ Entertainment, Moonrail Limited, EOD Code SRL, Samaki, Lone Rock Holdings, and Novaforge. Each will have to pay €5 million (€30 million in total).

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The Argentine justice system has found an ingenious solution to prevent celebrities and influencers promote unauthorized online gambling. After investigating 110 celebrities in the country to use their images in advertisements for this type of online gambling, has reached a legal settlement with 27 of them. To reverse the bad publicity they had generated, some of them had to record a video with the opposite message warning of the dangers of illegal gambling and post it on their social media to avoid a potential conviction for having previously advertised.

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Badalona's new bingo - the sixth recreational hall in the city - will have within a 400-metre radius four educational centers, two mental health services and, right opposite, a soup kitchen. The business will be located between the neighbourhoods of Llefià and Sant Roc, one of the points with the highest poverty rate in the area around Barcelona. "We have many social problems and also security and anti-social behaviour issues. Putting it [the bingo] here is a time bomb. It will bring more misery to many families and more difficulties in an area hit hard by the crisis," says Ignacio Segura, of the platform Stop Cases de Apuestas a Llefià, which brings together entities and communities against the establishment.

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