Neostake in danger – My personal view on the current situation

This message is primarily aimed at the Neostake team and at users who would like to know how some people manage to generate such an incredible amount of wealth. I would therefore ask you to read through the whole message to get an overall picture of the situation.

I have been closely monitoring the markets and everything surrounding them over the last 3–4 weeks, and I am therefore QUITE, QUITE certain about what I am about to say. As a user with over 100k in assets, I also understand how the markets work.

This specifically concerns the number one spot on the leaderboard (Liam Galetzki) and all the tactics and tricks he has up his sleeve to succeed.

1.) The bets he places: It’s striking that certain proposals often have very few upvotes at first and then receive a lot in a short space of time. Specifically, I observed that proposals often received 15 votes late in the evening so that they went live during the night, at times when the average user has no chance of trading. As this naturally offers an advantage, but the outcome of normal bets is uncertain, the following has now been done:

2.) Instead of creating interesting and creative bets, only certain bets were set up – ones that ran for just a short period of a few days and where the outcome was almost 100% CERTAIN. Combined with 1.), this can be a way to make money. Examples of this include: MR. “BEAST YouTube Subscribers 26 June?”; “Most viewed video on 30 June?”; “Best-selling games console ever by 16 June?”.

3.) As this is, of course, not enough, bets now come into play that incorporate 1.) and 2.) and can also be MANIPULATED by the user (Liam) HIMSELF, as he can DETERMINE the OUTCOME HIMSELF. Examples of this include all the ‘amount … net worth by’ bets and the ‘highest-ranked student on the leaderboard’ bets.

Here’s a quick explanation of why this is so messed up and why only Liam Galetzki stands to benefit: he sets up these bets and, as soon as they go live, buys the option using the value of networth that exceeds his current net worth. This encourages other users to back the same option, as it’s the most likely outcome, which in turn increases his net worth – a self-fulfilling prophecy, in other words. The top 5 people on the leaderboard have no choice but to enter this market too, as otherwise the gap between them and Liam will keep getting bigger. So they can only MAINTAIN the gap, and if they don’t want to support this, they LOSE ground compared to Liam. He is therefore in a position – and you have to be number 1 to be in this position – where he can control everything through his bets and gain an unfair advantage.

How I know that he buys his own bets: 1. He’s the only one who can really profit from them. 2. The ‘social’ feature on Neostake shows shared bets; I was able to verify this by buying and selling.

And the biggest piece of evidence is the ‘Highest Neostake market cap 27 June?’ bet, which was voided. That’s the biggest scandal, and it’s incredibly important that Neostake put a stop to it. He lost around 200k in assets as a result. Just look at what happened to the odds and you’ll immediately understand what went on there. In the “Will Starmer be removed as PM by July?” bet, it was bought and sold repeatedly to artificially inflate the value. The fact that this isn’t the market cap but actually the volume brings me to my next point:

4.) The title, description and resolution are deliberately worded so poorly in order to mislead other users and send them down the wrong track. ‘Market cap’ would imply that the entire amount of money invested in the bet is at stake, but the term ‘volume’ is deliberately omitted from the title to give the impression that the value fluctuates both up and down. In reality, however, this value can only rise – and quite rapidly at that – if you simply buy, sell, buy, sell, and so on.

5.) One gets the feeling that Liam Galetzki wants to persuade the Neostake devs to introduce new features that benefit him. It’s always justified as if it were a good thing for everyone. The required number of votes was reduced to 15 (previously 20) because many people realised that the bets are simply poor and therefore stopped liking his proposals. His reasoning was that there was little interaction and people weren’t liking the proposals, BUT NO: they didn’t want to like THIS TYPE of proposal. Incidentally, this makes it easier for him and his group to get the bets live (see 1.)). That was the REAL REASON behind the proposal back then.

6.) He insults you by calling you stupid if you legitimately point out problems in the proposal. Because it’s often so vague and poorly or misleadingly worded, the average user doesn’t know what it’s about, and if the source or website is missing, it’s simply impossible to resolve the bet. But the main thing is that you’re insulted and called stupid straight away, rather than the proposal being deleted and rewritten properly. Personally, I think the resolution generated by the AI is well-written if you put in a bit of effort beforehand. It’s absolutely vital for a good bet that the resolution is clear and unambiguous; otherwise, you’ll have problems later on when it comes to settling the bet correctly.

7.) His current proposal poses a further danger: he wants it to be possible for ‘concerns’ to be ‘disliked’ and then disappear. Anyone who raises legitimate concerns is to be banned… (you can’t be serious). This proposal, along with the suggestion in the comments to limit upvotes to just 10, is intended to completely undermine the democratic process of voting, because he and his group would then be able to push through anything. Dictator Liam. Please, dear Neostake team, don’t fall for this – there are plenty of people who vote, but they only vote for good bets; I’ve never seen a proposal reported without good reason – there are always valid reasons (except for the ‘Plex’ bet).

My advice to all Neostake users: When voting, always think about whether it’s a creative and genuine bet or whether only one person stands to benefit, and stop voting for such nonsense. We need more cool bets again and fewer bets on Neostake that can be manipulated.

To the Neostake team: Perhaps it would be helpful if markets could only go live within a certain time window – for example, during normal university hours rather than in the middle of the night – or if a specific time were set in advance and displayed, so that the first-mover advantage isn’t quite so significant.

You should also completely ban the sort of bets I’ve described, and the behaviour of Liam Galetzki, as well as the other people involved in this matter, should result in serious consequences. Otherwise, I see the fun this platform is meant to provide – and what is actually a very good concept – at risk.

Best regards,

A concerned user