Why Polycopy says insufficient balance while Polymarket shows hundreds of dollars. Money in open positions is not spendable, with a worked example and how to free up cash.
Last updated August 22, 2026
This is the most common funding confusion on Polycopy, and it is not a bug. Polymarket shows you one number, your portfolio value. Your copies can only spend a different, usually smaller number: cash. Once you have bought positions, those two numbers stop matching, and the gap keeps widening as the bot works.
Your liquid pUSD balance. Money sitting idle, committed to nothing. This is the only money a copy or an Auto Copy bot can spend.
Cash plus the current market value of every open position you hold. It is what your account is worth. It is not what you can spend.
Every time a copy fills, cash turns into a position. Portfolio value barely moves, because you swapped dollars for shares worth roughly the same. Cash falls by the full amount. Run a bot for a week without selling anything and your portfolio can look healthy while your cash sits near zero.
The symptom is a bot that has quietly stopped placing trades, or a manual copy that fails with an insufficient balance message, on an account that clearly has money in it. Before you change any settings, check your cash rather than your portfolio value. Nine times out of ten it explains the whole thing.
Fees make the edge tighter than it looks. A copy costs the ticket, plus a flat 0.5% from Polycopy, plus Polymarket's own fee on markets that charge one. Cash of exactly $5 is not quite enough for a $5 copy.
| Event | Cash | Portfolio value |
|---|---|---|
A copy fills | Falls by the ticket plus fees | Roughly unchanged |
A position gains value | Unchanged | Rises |
You sell a position | Rises by the proceeds | Roughly unchanged |
A market resolves in your favour | Rises by $1.00 per share | Roughly unchanged |
A market resolves against you | Unchanged | Falls by whatever the position was still marked at |
You deposit | Rises | Rises |
Selling converts a position straight back into cash. You can sell from Polycopy or on Polymarket. The cash is available again as soon as the sell fills.
When a market resolves, winning shares pay out $1.00 each into your cash balance automatically and losing shares pay nothing. Resolution is the slow route, but it needs nothing from you. See What Happens When a Market Resolves.
If you want the existing positions to keep running, add funds on Polymarket. See How to Deposit Funds for Copy Trading.
A bot that copies everything will always end up here. Following fewer traders, or tightening the rules on what qualifies for a copy, leaves cash spare for the trades you actually wanted.
Cash explains most cases. When it does not, these do.
Money may not be the constraint. Thin markets, filters, and cooldowns all block copies too. See Why Is My Bot Not Trading?.
That usually means the wallet you connected is not the account you funded. See How to Disconnect or Change Your Wallet.
Positions under the exchange floor of 5 shares cannot be sold at all, so that money is locked until the market resolves. See Minimum Sizes and Positions Too Small to Sell.
Polymarket is showing your portfolio value, which includes open positions. Polycopy shows what a trade can actually spend, which is cash. Both numbers are correct, they are just answering different questions.
No. Polycopy holds nothing and reserves nothing. Every dollar is either cash in your Polymarket account or a position you own. If something is not spendable, it is because you bought something with it.