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Before you can start market making, you need to complete these one-time setup steps — deposit USDC.e to Polygon, deploy a wallet, approve tokens for trading, and generate API credentials.
1

Deposit USDC.e

Market makers need USDC.e on Polygon to fund their trading operations.
MethodBest ForDocumentation
Bridge APIAutomated deposits from other chainsBridge Deposit
Direct Polygon transferAlready have USDC.e on PolygonN/A
Cross-chain bridgeLarge deposits from EthereumSupported Assets

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Using the Bridge API

// Get deposit addresses for your Polymarket wallet
const deposit = await fetch("https://bridge.polymarket.com/deposit", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: { "Content-Type": "application/json" },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    address: "YOUR_POLYMARKET_WALLET_ADDRESS",
  }),
});

// Returns deposit addresses for EVM, SVM, and BTC networks
const addresses = await deposit.json();
// Send USDC to the appropriate address for your source chain
2

Deploy a Wallet

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EOA

Standard Ethereum wallet. You pay for all onchain transactions (approvals, splits, merges, trade execution).

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Safe Wallet

Gnosis Safe-based wallet deployed via Polymarket’s relayer. Benefits:
  • Gasless transactions — Polymarket pays gas fees for onchain operations
  • Contract wallet — Enables advanced features like batched transactions
Deploy a Safe wallet using the Relayer Client:
import { RelayClient, RelayerTxType } from "@polymarket/builder-relayer-client";

const client = new RelayClient(
  "https://relayer-v2.polymarket.com/",
  137, // Polygon mainnet
  signer,
  builderConfig,
  RelayerTxType.SAFE,
);

// Deploy the Safe wallet
const response = await client.deploy();
const result = await response.wait();
console.log("Safe Address:", result?.proxyAddress);
See Gasless Transactions for full Relayer Client setup including local and remote signing configurations.
3

Approve Tokens

Before trading, you must approve the exchange contracts to spend your tokens.

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Required Approvals

TokenSpenderPurpose
USDC.eCTF ContractSplit USDC.e into outcome tokens
CTF (outcome tokens)CTF ExchangeTrade outcome tokens
CTF (outcome tokens)Neg Risk CTF ExchangeTrade neg-risk market tokens

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Contract Addresses

const ADDRESSES = {
  USDCe: "0x2791Bca1f2de4661ED88A30C99A7a9449Aa84174",
  CTF: "0x4D97DCd97eC945f40cF65F87097ACe5EA0476045",
  CTF_EXCHANGE: "0x4bFb41d5B3570DeFd03C39a9A4D8dE6Bd8B8982E",
  NEG_RISK_CTF_EXCHANGE: "0xC5d563A36AE78145C45a50134d48A1215220f80a",
  NEG_RISK_ADAPTER: "0xd91E80cF2E7be2e162c6513ceD06f1dD0dA35296",
};

​
Approve via Relayer Client

import { ethers } from "ethers";
import { Interface } from "ethers/lib/utils";

const erc20Interface = new Interface([
  "function approve(address spender, uint256 amount) returns (bool)",
]);

// Approve USDCe for CTF contract
const approveTx = {
  to: ADDRESSES.USDCe,
  data: erc20Interface.encodeFunctionData("approve", [
    ADDRESSES.CTF,
    ethers.constants.MaxUint256,
  ]),
  value: "0",
};

const response = await client.execute([approveTx], "Approve USDCe for CTF");
await response.wait();
4

Generate API Credentials

To place orders and access authenticated endpoints, you need L2 API credentials derived from your wallet.
import { ClobClient } from "@polymarket/clob-client";

const client = new ClobClient("https://clob.polymarket.com", 137, signer);

// Derive API credentials from your wallet
const credentials = await client.createOrDeriveApiKey();
console.log("API Key:", credentials.key);
console.log("Secret:", credentials.secret);
console.log("Passphrase:", credentials.passphrase);
Once you have credentials, initialize the client for authenticated operations:
const tradingClient = new ClobClient(
  "https://clob.polymarket.com",
  137,
  wallet,
  credentials,
);
See Authentication for full details on signature types and REST API headers.

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Next Steps

Trading

Post limit orders and manage quotes

Market Data

Connect to real-time market data