Polymarket introduces Taker fees in the 15-minute crypto market

On January 6th, prediction market platform Polymarket updated its official documentation to show that it has introduced taker-only fees in its 15-minute cycle cryptocurrency price movement markets, marking a shift from its long-standing “zero fee” trading model. According to the update, the relevant fees will be used to fund market maker liquidity incentives, and all fees paid by takers will be returned daily to liquidity providers in USDC, rather than retained by the platform. This adjustment applies only to 15-minute crypto markets, while most other markets continue to operate with zero fees. The fee level varies with market probability, reaching its highest when the price is near 50%, and approaching zero as it nears 0% or 100%. Using the official example, trading 100 contracts at a price of $0.50 would incur approximately $1.56 in fees, which is about 3% of the transaction amount at the peak of the fee curve. The adjustment was not announced with an official statement, but the documentation history indicates that this clause is a new addition. The community generally believes that this change is not a platform-wide fee implementation but an optimization of market structure to target high-frequency bots and wash trading, aiming to improve liquidity quality and narrow spreads. Polymarket states that long-term event markets, political markets, and non-crypto prediction markets are unaffected, and the overall impact on ordinary users is limited.