My college roommate works at a coffee shop, earning $15 an hour, and works 36 hours a week. Last Tuesday, he came back and said he had saved up $500 and wanted to invest it somewhere.

He told me, "Don’t ask me, I’ve been losing money trading stocks recently, I really don’t know."
He sat next to me, opened Claude on his computer, and typed a line: "I have $500 in savings, I can't afford to lose it, but I want it to grow. What can small money do that big money can’t?"
Claude replied with a message, and we both stared in shock after reading it.
Rich people compete on speed and scale. Small money has only one advantage: you can buy things that are so cheap others are too lazy to bother with. For example, a $0.005 event, with a $5 bet, hits and you get $2,500. Big funds can’t bet $5, but you can. Claude also said that some people are already doing this—search for planktonXD on Polymarket.
We looked it up.
planktonXD, $95,393 profit. 78,097 predictions. Registered in February 2025. The profile says: "Just for fun."
Here’s the wallet:
78,097 bets, mostly between $4 and $25, most of which lost everything. But those that didn’t—
S&P 500 opening direction, $4.55 bet, payout of $2,531. ROI: 55,545%.
My roommate stared at those numbers for a long time and said, "He just bet $4.55 and won $2,500."
I asked Claude to calculate it.
Claude said: "Suppose there are 100 events, each costing 1 cent. You bet $5 on each, for a total of $500. 97 lose, losing $485. 3 win, each paying out $500, totaling $1,500. Net profit: $1,015. This strategy works because the crowd overestimates the likelihood of 'probably happening' and underestimates the chance of 'possibly happening.'"
planktonXD didn’t hit three times. He bet hundreds of times, repeatedly rolling over $500 for 14 months.
$95,393 earned from bets most people would laugh at.
That night, my roommate deposited $50 and followed six bets under $1. I told him most would probably lose everything. He said, "If just one hits like that S&P bet, I could earn a month’s rent working at the coffee shop."
He’s still working at the coffee shop, earning $15 an hour. But now, during his breaks, he’s looking at his phone—not to watch videos.
78,097 predictions, and the profile still says "Just for fun." This wallet doesn’t care about your salary; it cares about the cheap stuff nobody wants to buy.
I asked Claude again: What do you call someone who wins $2,500 betting $4.50?
Claude said: "Patience." Others in the market call him lucky. So, this advantage still exists.
Follow the trades here: