NPR finds "no sign" of Polymarket at its Panama HQ address

162

iilamont about 3 hours ago 71 commentsRead Article on npr.org

ES version is available. Content is displayed in original English for accuracy.

⚡ Community Insights

Discussion Sentiment

65% Positive

Analyzed from 1880 words in the discussion.

Discussion (71 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews

forshaper•about 2 hours ago

I don't get it. Most companies registered in the state I live in, for example, are not actually located here. They simply receive mail through their registered agent there. Why would this be news?

raddan•about 2 hours ago

On the other hand, most of the companies registered in Delaware are not trying to dodge US federal regulations. Polymarket is prohibited from operating in the US market. Nevertheless they have a substantial customer base in the US, and the part left unsaid in the NPR story, is that they’re probably also headquartered in the US. Almost definitely a violation of either gambling or securities regulations.

trollbridge•about 1 hour ago

They are often trying to dodge their local state’s regulations, though.

_--__--__•about 1 hour ago

Incorporating in Delaware was initially attractive because of usury laws that matter to a small number of business sectors.

The charitable take is that most corporations want to comply with a state's regulations because unintentional compliance violations are painful and expensive, and it is relatively easy to be confident that you are compliant as a Delaware corp.

dhosek•34 minutes ago

When I had a C-corp in the 90s for a magazine I was publishing, my dad’s cousin insisted that I should incorporate in Delaware or Nevada. The thing is that because I was operating in California, especially at the small scale that I operated, it did nothing for me at all really. I would still pay California taxes and be subject to California regulations. Mostly it would make a difference if I were sued.

(Obligatory disclaimer that these are ~30-year-old memories of some dumb 20-something’s understanding of the law at the time.)

mywacaday•about 1 hour ago

I used to work for a large financial services company who bought 4 storey office block and fitted it out with very small but with own door individual offices that had internet and a connected desk phone so that companies could rent them and say they had more than a box office address in that European capital, I never found out what the rent was.

pear01•about 1 hour ago

Polymarket is already working on a full return to the US market aided by sympathetic policy changes of the current administration.

Additionally, the claim "most of the companies registered in Delaware are not trying to dodge US federal regulations" strikes me as dubious. Every company seeks to lower its regulatory burden. If they're not finding loopholes, then often they're the ones writing the regulations and funding congressional campaigns. I'm not sure the claim Polymarket is unique re its relationship to the government in this respect is credible. They seem to be working quite intimately with the current administration on returning from their Biden era "ban".

raddan•17 minutes ago

There’s dodging and then there’s _dodging_. If you are operating in a legal gray area, that’s an unsavory business practice that is, as you say, widespread. Then there’s operating illegally in full view of everybody. I do not personally ascribe to the idea that a thing is OK just because one is not currently being prosecuted. Polymarket (and Kalshi) is bad for the country, their claims to the contrary are highly dubious, and it’s a case where not only are they actually in the wrong, they are quite specifically legally wrong.

fsckboy•15 minutes ago

>the claim "most of the companies registered in Delaware are not trying to dodge US federal regulations" strikes me as dubious

huh? you aren't making a coherent argument. registering in any US state you are still subject to the same federal regulations, Delaware is not different, it offers no shelter from federal regulations.

in fact, if it is not your primary state of operation, then it subjects you to federal regulations for interstate commerce where you might not otherwise be.

Extropy_•about 2 hours ago

They acknowledge this in the article as well, surprisingly enough.

> Corporate law experts say while there is nothing illegal about housing a business inside a shell company, the practice is often a strategic move to protect a firm's wealth or shield it against lawsuits and action from government regulators.

What is the thought process of someone writing this? Does this article have any meaningful or critical thought behind it?

horacemorace•about 2 hours ago

They’re avoiding editorializing. PBS news has the same dry “facts only” flavor. Legitimate reporting takes the high road; corpo-media too often take the low road. Unfortunately human information consumers tend to gravitate toward sources of maximum opinion.

randallsquared•5 minutes ago

Do you think "housing a business inside a shell company" is not editorializing when referring (apparently) to running a company that has a registered agent in a normal, permissive jurisdiction like Panama, Ireland, or Delaware?

janalsncm•about 2 hours ago

It isn’t newsworthy for people who believe the laws around corporate transparency and accountability are good enough.

Many people do not, which is why it is noteworthy, even if it is standard.

Exoristos•about 1 hour ago

They're doing their part in keeping a spotlight on Polymarket. The content of the article is not irrelevant, but it is less important than the existence of the article.

forshaper•about 2 hours ago

I guess we're scratching our heads, and even we clicked.

creatonez•about 2 hours ago

It is indeed already normal for rich people to do things that are sketchy as hell.

Maybe let's make it not normal?

tt24•about 1 hour ago

Registered agents are sketchy now?

creatonez•about 1 hour ago

If the only shell(s) for a business are in a completely different jurisdiction with no connection whatsoever to any of the humans involved in operating the organization... yes. It's an outrageous way to escape the force of the law that has been rubber stamped by corrupt politicians.

JuniperMesos•about 2 hours ago

I really don't trust your definition of sketchy as hell and don't want it to have legal or normative force.

creatonez•about 1 hour ago

For-profit companies jurisdiction shopping without any physical presence is so clearly sketchy that it's wild anyone could see it otherwise. I can't imagine a normal person not being shocked in disbelief when they first learn about the concept of tax havens.

otterley•about 1 hour ago

You haven't heard their definition yet.

alpb•43 minutes ago

this is a good explainer video that talks about why Polymarket maintains a Panama HQ instead of a US one and why it has two different sites (.us vs .com). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seNwZhK4UdA

Carioca•about 2 hours ago

> Why would this be news?

Mostly because international litigation is, let's say, fraught issues (as in "good luck!")

forshaper•about 2 hours ago

Yes. Is that news?

JuniperMesos•about 2 hours ago

Because NPR dislikes polymarket and thinks that reporting this will discredit them.

shermantanktop•about 1 hour ago

If the facts themselves discredit Polymarket, NPR doesn't have to like or dislike them. Polymarket made itself newsworthy, it can't complain if someone looks at them closely.

micromacrofoot•29 minutes ago

is it not true? from my perspective they're just stating a fact that some people may not be aware of (registering a business in a location it doesn't physically exist in)

NuclearPM•about 1 hour ago

It does.

dweez•about 2 hours ago

If you follow Apple's official address to a lawyer's office in Delaware, don't be surprised that Tim Cook isn't there to greet you.

kibwen•about 1 hour ago

Apple is registered in California, as both their website ( https://investor.apple.com/faq/default.aspx ) and their most recent form 8-K ( https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0000320193/beb2c24... ) confirm.

kjkjadksj•about 1 hour ago

Is Apple Europe still a dublin po box?

dewey•30 minutes ago

They have 6000 employees located in Ireland including most of their support staff for the EU. They just opened another office in Dublin.

https://www.siliconrepublic.com/business/apple-to-open-dubli...

trollbridge•about 1 hour ago

Indeed, their registered agent address is 1209 North Orange Street in Wilmington.

quietsegfault•about 1 hour ago

So what? A registered agent is literally the agent registered to accept process service. The registered agent is clearly not the corporate headquarters, a branch office, or anything other than a business whose purpose is to accept lawsuits, subpoenas, and other legal and official notices.

EA-3167•about 2 hours ago

For what it's worth the only "official address" I could find was Apple Park in Cupertino.

ares623•about 1 hour ago

It's an interesting "problem". The cities we have now exist because businesses and people want to be located in the same geographical area to maximize, well, doing business.

Now the opposite is happening. Businesses have no incentive being located in the same physical area they do business in. In fact, they have opposite incentives. The closer they are to their customers and workers, the less they can do things with impunity.

NooneAtAll3•about 2 hours ago

to be fair, empty non-existing official office is nothing new. iirc, Delaware has a warehouse that's official residence of hundreds of corporations (for tax reasons)

I don't understand the rest of the article, tho... It complains that company that (officially) left the US market and already blocks US ips from participating... isn't doing enough? Officially there's no ground to demand more

If you really want to solve the problem - start hunting down unofficial means. Investigate influencers that started mentioning Polymarket out of the blue. Look into news outlets that decided to start mentioning polymarket as supposed proxy of popular opinion. Start advertizing campaigns against gambling addiction the same way as against smoking

ThomW•about 2 hours ago

Why are Americans allowed to invest in a business that would be illegal if based in the US? Why can they be patrons? Idgi

kristopolous•21 minutes ago

Most of the things you buy are manufactured under conditions that aren't legal in the US as well.

It doesn't make it acceptable, just endemic

kube-system•30 minutes ago

Breaking the law doesn’t follow the transitive property. Many businesses that people interact with have done illegal things. You typically can do business with someone as long as you aren’t breaking the law in doing so.

xiphias2•about 2 hours ago

There's an easy way for polymarket to have a nice office in a nice city in USA: legalize it there and have nice enough regulations and incentives for it to move there.

It would help a lot actually for protecting people's money instead of driving it offshore.

But it doesn't look like making USA compete in this $15B market is NPR's goal with this article.

soraminazuki•about 1 hour ago

While you're at it, let's legalize pig butchering scams too.

"It would help a lot actually for protecting people's money instead of driving it offshore. But it doesn't look like making USA compete in this $75B market is NPR's goal with this article."

BowBun•about 2 hours ago

Good on NPR. These markets are a cancer on society and should be outlawed further.

alchemist1e9•about 1 hour ago

Does anyone have a good source that details these negative effects? I’m not doubting they exist, I mean gambling in general has many negative externalities, but I’m just interested in identifying the cancer aspects more specifically.

shermantanktop•about 1 hour ago

Would you go to a cancer doctor if you knew they were betting on Polymarket as to whether you would do well in your cancer treatment?

Polymarket appears to have people who have both the ability to shape outcomes and anonymously profit on those outcomes.

kjkjadksj•43 minutes ago

Theres evidence to suggest people in government are using it to front run actions on iran for profit for example. Is this useful to the public to have their lawmakers engage in side bets and dare I even say, game fixing as we see in sports but in the real world with bombs and deaths?

sophrosyne42•about 1 hour ago

I have yet to see an argument against them that isn't more than personal disgust

otterley•about 1 hour ago

How hard are you looking? "I haven't seen arguments" doesn't mean much if you're not looking for them. You might as well have had a blindfold on. It's as meaningful as saying "I haven't seen arguments as to why Rust eliminates memory safety bugs."

Here's an example: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK230628/

This is another excellent article that discusses some of the problems, and has links to other such articles: https://www.wsj.com/finance/investing/polymarket-kalshi-bett...

guizadillas•about 2 hours ago

why would they do that if the whole business depends on not having regulations?

sophrosyne42•about 1 hour ago

Which regulations in particular? All businesses rely on governments not choking them into nonexistence by having regulations that harm that business. Regulations are not an amorphus blob. There are other regulations that would also benefit a business to enable its existence, but we would not say (or should not say) that "the whole business relies on having regulations," because that is being intentionally vague about what the regulations in question actually are. The way you phrase it almost implied there is inherently something dangerous or suspect about something that is universal about how regulations can effect businesses.

hx8•about 2 hours ago

I'm sure this is true for thousands and thousands of companies.

EA-3167•about 2 hours ago

Maybe that should be discouraged? Even if you don't think so, most companies aren't de facto attempts to skirt gambling regulations while also incentivizing corruption and fraud in everyday life.

tick_tock_tick•about 1 hour ago

What happened to the quality of NPR over the last dozen or so years it's just gotten worse and worse.

lokar•about 1 hour ago

Can you explain what you did not like in the story?

dyauspitr•about 1 hour ago

It’s gotten better and more in depth and grounded in my opinion.

ChrisMarshallNY•about 2 hours ago

So Polymarket is a Web3 outfit?

londons_explore•about 2 hours ago

It might as well be a regular website. The crypto bit adds nothing since 99.9% of users just use the webUI.

jcgrillo•about 2 hours ago

"Court filings show the law office also did work for FTX"

If the shoe fits..

exogeny•40 minutes ago

Polymarket is based in NYC, in Soho, on Crosby Street. Knock yourself out if you want to go find anyone there.

nullc•16 minutes ago

Whois on npr.org just returns markmonitor.com... some how I don't think I'll find the author of this piece if I visit markmonitor's mailing address.

Any bets on if we'll find the author of this piece at NPR's agent address 1156 15TH STREET NW, Suite 605, Washington, DC, 20005, USA -- CSC REGISTERED AGENT SERVICES.

Perhaps I should fly there and post an article about not finding them, and post a couple pictures! Oh wait, I don't own a massive media outlet---- must be why I didn't know that its not interesting to fail to find companies at their registered agent addresses. What's NPR's excuse?

otterley•about 1 hour ago

I'm shocked--shocked--that a company with the integrity and upright moral character of Polymarket would have their registered agent located in Panama.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers#Illegal_activiti...

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/the-panama-pape...

(Wow. It's only been 10 years since the leak occurred? How time flies.)

skywhopper•about 2 hours ago

Polymarket engages in scammy behavior?? Wait, isn’t that their entire business model?

EdwardDiego•about 2 hours ago

The part where all their legal troubles went away when one of the President's sons became an "advisor" says "yes".

raddan•about 2 hours ago

I don’t know why you were modded down because this is mostly true. They are still prohibited from operating in the US but it appears that regulators have no appetite to enforce the law.

gordian-mind•about 2 hours ago

"the wildly popular prediction market site that has flourished in President Trump's second term."

The only purpose I could see for this intro is to prime the reader negatively before any argument.

NDlurker•about 2 hours ago

Water is wet

dayyan•35 minutes ago

"NPR finds 'no sign' of Polymarket's office; sources say the reporting team was 'deeply unsettled' to find a company operating without a mandatory 40-minute 'Land Acknowledgment' in the lobby."