pUSD

Overview

pUSD is the collateral token for every trade on Polymarket. The documentation describes it as a standard ERC-20 wrapper that represents a USDC claim, deployed on Polygon mainnet with 6 decimals. Polymarket moved the platform onto it from bridged USDC.e on 28 April 2026 at around 11:00 UTC, in the release that also shipped CTF Exchange V2. Trading paused for approximately one hour.

The link to the US dollar is indirect. A pUSD holder holds a claim on native USDC or bridged USDC.e, and whatever backs those tokens backs pUSD. DIA's registry records about 25,000 holders on Polygon.

Sources: Polymarket Documentation, Polymarket USD (pUSD) concept page, Polymarket Help Center, Polymarket Exchange Upgrade: April 28, 2026

Backing and reserves

What the contract enforces

The CollateralToken implementation is verified on Polygon. Wrapping transfers the deposited asset to an immutable VAULT address and mints an equal amount of pUSD. Unwrapping pulls the asset back from that vault and burns the token. Only two assets pass the validity check: native USDC and bridged USDC.e. The collateral does not sit in the token contract. It sits at the vault address, an ERC-1967 proxy over a SingleOwnerMSCA implementation. Read on chain on 19 August 2026, that address held about $474 million of bridged USDC.e.

What no document covers

Polymarket publishes no reserve attestation, no proof-of-reserves report, and no auditor opinion on the collateral held. The documentation index carries no transparency page. The published security material is two smart contract audits of the ctf-exchange-v2 repository, not a reserve engagement. Quantstamp produced one report and Cantina the other.

Sources: Blockscout Polygon, verified source of the pUSD CollateralToken implementation, Blockscout Polygon, vault address 0xC417fD8E... shown as ERC1967Proxy over SingleOwnerMSCA, Polymarket Help Center, Polymarket Exchange Upgrade: April 28, 2026, naming Cantina and Quantstamp as the auditors

Peg behaviour

pUSD has no external market setting its price. Polymarket states there are no current plans to list it on external exchanges, so par comes from the wrap and unwrap functions rather than an order book. Redemption runs through the CollateralOfframp contract at 1:1 into USDC.e. DIA's registry recorded a price of 1.0058 USD, above the redemption rate the offramp enforces. The mechanics of a fiat-backed stablecoin apply one layer down, at the token pUSD wraps.

Sources: Polymarket Documentation, Polymarket USD (pUSD) concept page

Where it is used

pUSD circulates inside Polymarket and nowhere else by design. Deposits from Ethereum, Solana, Bitcoin, Tron and other EVM chains route through per-wallet bridge addresses and convert to pUSD on Polygon automatically. Either native USDC or bridged USDC.e can be the source asset, and both wrap through the CollateralOnramp contract. The adapter layer unwraps pUSD back into USDC.e whenever a trade touches the conditional token framework. The token itself is a standard transferable ERC-20.

Sources: Polymarket Documentation, Bridge Deposit page, Polymarket Documentation, Polymarket USD (pUSD) concept page

Risks

CollateralToken is a UUPS proxy whose owner authorizes upgrades, so the token logic can change. That owner is a Timelock contract with a minimum delay of 12 hours, read on chain by DIA on 19 August 2026. Ramp admins can pause wrapping and unwrapping per asset, which stops redemption while the pause holds.

Sources: Blockscout Polygon, verified source of the pUSD CollateralToken implementation, Blockscout Polygon, verified Timelock contract that owns CollateralToken

What this map tracks

The Global Stablecoin Map tracks pUSD on Polygon only, at the CollateralToken proxy 0xC011a7E12a19f7B1f670d46F03B03f3342E82DFB. Polymarket deploys every contract on Polygon mainnet, so no supply sits on another network. The map records about 25,000 holders and a price of 1.0058 USD, both first-party registry data, and files the coin under the global region alongside the rest of the stablecoin explorer.

No issuer-reported reserve figure enters the map, because Polymarket publishes none. Backing is checkable only by reading the vault address on Polygon.

Sources: Polymarket Documentation, Contracts page listing the pUSD CollateralToken proxy on Polygon, Blockscout Polygon, pUSD token record (name, symbol, decimals, holders)

Common questions