Lula Wins Fourth Term in Brazil, Defying Prediction Market Odds

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won Brazil’s presidential runoff on October 25, securing a fourth term after overcoming Senator Flávio Bolsonaro’s first-round lead. Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court reported that Lula received 64,256,232 votes, representing 51.79% of valid ballots, in an announcement published October 26.

The result reversed the order established in the opening round. According to Brazil’s Senate news service, Bolsonaro finished the October 4 vote with 47.03%, ahead of Lula’s 45.16%, before the incumbent recovered in the decisive contest three weeks later. That reversal gave the election a different outcome from the one favored by prediction-market traders.

Bitcoin.com News reported that Polymarket assigned Bolsonaro an approximately 80% chance of victory at midday on election day. Those odds subsequently swung toward Lula as results emerged, the outlet said. Its account describes a substantial repricing as traders confronted vote totals that challenged their earlier expectations.

The distinction between market probabilities and election results is important when interpreting that reversal. An 80% implied probability still allows for the less-favored candidate to win; it is not a guarantee or a projected vote share. A single upset therefore does not, by itself, establish whether a forecasting system consistently overstates or understates candidates’ chances.

For Brazil, the immediate political significance is the continuation of Lula’s presidency rather than the change in leadership traders had anticipated. The Senate news service described the victory as his fourth presidential mandate. His recovery also demonstrates why a first-round advantage cannot simply be treated as a settled outcome when voters return for a two-candidate contest.

The surprise extended into cryptocurrency-based trading. Bitcoin.com News reported that a perpetual contract linked to EWZ, the iShares MSCI Brazil ETF, fell more than 22% on Hyperliquid after Lula’s victory was announced. That reported move concerned a derivative linked to the fund, not a confirmed equivalent decline in the ETF’s underlying shares.

The outlet connected the reaction to investors reassessing expectations for economic policy after positioning for a Bolsonaro victory. However, the information available does not establish how broadly that derivative’s decline would translate into Brazilian equities or other assets. A sharp movement in one instrument should not be read as a complete measure of the national market’s response.

Attention now turns to the formal postelection process and whether broader asset prices follow the initial reaction reported in crypto trading. Brazil’s official electoral calendar sets December 18 as the deadline for certification of elected candidates and January 5, 2027, for the presidential inauguration. For prediction-market observers, the remaining question is what the pre-election pricing reveals about forecasting performance, rather than whether a favored outcome was certain.