7 ms·
Newly created Polymarket accounts win big on well-timed Iran ceasefire bets
- MetaWhirledPeas 6mo agoI wonder if this sort of corruption will become a new negotiation tactic. Give us what we want and we'll delay the announcement long enough for you to make preparations. I don't know how Polymarket works, so maybe you can enlighten me: can Polymarket be subpoenaed to provide the recipients of the payouts? Is there some insulation to keep them ignorant of their identity?
- KumaBear 6mo agoThere is a reason they deal in crypto and are not headquartered in the US
- Spooky23 6mo agoNew York is suing them for access as they have the ability to regulate gambling. The federal government is fighting this attempts, backing the company’s assertion that a “prediction market” is not gambling, and the Feds have sole regulatory power. Coincidentally, Donald Trump, Jr is an investor in Polymarket and an advisor to Kalshi.
- nojvek 6mo agoTrump family is in bed with a ton of shady firms. Soooo much crypto fraud. Most openly corrupt president of our time.
- KumaBear 6mo agoJust imagine how bad insider trading is on other markets. Stricter laws and crack downs should be implemented globally.
- sethops1 6mo agoOnce upon a time, people went to jail for insider trading on the stock market. Like that was an actual thing that was enforced with rigor.
- stinkbeetle 6mo agoI guess it makes our betters like Peolosi look bad though.
- mandeepj 6mo agoThey aren't looking to prosecute many people https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-sec-says-it-filed-456-enforcement-actions-during-fiscal-year-2025-2026-04-07/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-sec-says-it-file...
- SchemaLoad 6mo agoThe insiders are the ones writing the laws though.
- OutOfHere 6mo agoOr just don't gamble on a bet where insider swings can act against you. Simple.
- vlovich123 6mo agoGiven the accused breaking of ceasefire shortly after agreement, not sure how this bet really gets paid out.
- jagged-chisel 6mo agoThere were people who bet against… if there’s no one on the other side to take the opposite bet, you don’t have a bet. And you won’t get a payout.
- max-m 6mo agoI think the question was: Who gets the payout? The bet is: There will be a ceasefire. There was a ceasefire, but it was allegedly broken almost immediately after. So does that count as ceasefire or not? There are arguments for both sides, so you could also say it's a tie and neither party gets the cut and the bets will be refunded.
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- weird-eye-issue 6mo agoYou can just read the rules for that particular prediction on Polymarket yourself. In this case according to the rules it just comes down to whether or not there is an official ceasefire by a particular time. It does not say anything about what happens if the ceasefire is broken after that time so in that case it doesn't actually matter that it was broken.
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- denkmoon 6mo agoUsually the market have rules that define the bet more concretely than just "there will be a ceasefire", and resolutions can be disputed where they will be arbitrated by the market operator. For this particular market you can see that here (https://polymarket.com/event/us-x-iran-ceasefire-by https://polymarket.com/event/us-x-iran-ceasefire-by), but I'll paste the current text too: This market will resolve to “Yes” if there is an official ceasefire agreement, defined as a publicly announced and mutually agreed halt in direct military engagement, between the United States and Iran by the listed date, 11:59 PM ET. For the purposes of this market, an “official ceasefire agreement” requires clear public confirmation from both the United States government and the government of Iran that they have agreed to halt military hostilities against one another, or for an official ceasefire agreement to be otherwise confirmed to have been reached by an overwhelming consensus of media reporting. If the agreement is officially reached before the resolution date, this market will resolve to “Yes,” regardless of whether the ceasefire officially takes effect after the resolution date. Any form of informal understanding, backchannel communication, de-escalation without an announced agreement, or unilateral pause in hostilities will not be considered an official ceasefire. Humanitarian pauses, limited operational pauses, or temporary tactical stand-downs will not count toward the resolution of this market. A broader peace deal, normalization agreement, or political framework will qualify only if it includes a publicly announced and mutually agreed halt in military engagement between the United States and Iran, effective on a specified date, or otherwise confirmed by an overwhelming consensus of credible reporting. Agreements that outline future negotiations or de-escalation measures without an explicit, dated commitment to stop fighting will not qualify. This market’s resolution will be based on official statements from the United States government and the government of Iran. However, an overwhelming consensus of credible media reporting confirming that an official ceasefire agreement has been reached will suffice. So the real answer is, "whoever the market operator chooses".
- xoxxala 6mo agoThere's a saying in poker that if you sit down at the table and can't immediately find the donkey(1), you are the donkey. At some point, anyone playing around in a prediction without insider info will be the donkey. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_poker_terms#donkey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_poker_terms#donkey
- baq 6mo agoArguably it’s a very useful property of prediction markets as long as everyone is aware that’s the case.
- tasuki 6mo agoYes, and let me add that that's by design. Prediction markets' main function is to incentivize people with private information to make it public.
- mint5 6mo agoHow does making a wager cause insider info to be public? All it means is an anonymous account placed money on the outcome, how does it make public anything that an insider knows? It doesn’t. It incentives them to keep the info secret in order to profit or a wager on a related outcome. The insider info remains secret, all people know is some bloke stood up a new account and placed a big bet. And for these short timespan bets, it seems utterly useless. If the wagers were only allowed on things two weeks out, and not allow bets on short term events then maybe it could show more info.
- nl 6mo agoThe price movement is the indicator that there is insider information. Of course there are lots of problems with this theory - in large markets a single trader has to make large bets to move the market, and with the current leadership the price moves large amounts unpredictably as well based on the latest statements. But the mechanism itself makes sense. It's unclear if that's a good thing. Of course some people know secret information before hand. Is disclosing that always good?
- woah 6mo agoCan someone articulate what the harm of this is?
- ugh123 6mo agoIf an insider, say a member of the Department of Defense (or War, duh) bets a certain date: they could internally influence the decision to execute on that date rather than possibly a better (earlier?) date that could yield less damage or loss to either side.
- BugsJustFindMe 6mo agoBoth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_of_interest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_of_interest and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insider_trading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insider_trading when people able to influence outcomes are able to bet on those outcomes.
- cwnyth 6mo agoIt's a rigged game. If there's a bet that player X will foul player Y, without proper safeguards, player X can bet on himself and then intentionally player player Y. The actual harm is that by the rules of the betting, no one should know the outcome who could also bet on the game, so the losers are being robbed of their money. In this particular context, it's also possible that there are illicit transfers of money without being immediately noticeable. Bribery could happen at the highest levels with it being very difficult to trace and prosecute.
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- BugsJustFindMe 6mo ago> as records show substantial bets They're not bets anymore. Now they're swaps.
- jzl 6mo agoIs there really that much liquidity in these bets? Polymarket is just a broker right? So people are putting up tens of millions cumulatively on the other side of these random bets?
- CamperBob2 6mo agoThe only business at which Trump has ever really succeeded is money laundering. That might be a clue as to what is actually going on.
- stinkbeetle 6mo agoIs this really true? What is the evidence that Trump succeeded in money laundering, where is the dirty money coming from in these particular bets, and how do you propose the polymarket betting mechanism is able to clean the money?
- Spooky23 6mo agoA1: https://www.theusconstitution.org/litigation/trump-v-deutsche-bank-ag-capital-one/ https://www.theusconstitution.org/litigation/trump-v-deutsch... A2: I don’t know. It would be great if the Department of Justice or Treasury investigated the matter, since the SEC no longer has the capability. However, since the interim Attorney General is a simp who expresses his love for the president repeatedly, that’s unlikely. A3: Polymarket could make an effort to prevent activity that undermines the integrity of their platform. All betting platforms work to detect the use of the platforms by people like Baseball players and their families. Most public employees names are public, so it should not be impossible to do the same. The fact that obvious behavior like this happens reflects poorly on the platform. It’s pretty incredible that bettors are stupid enough to use a platform that actively undermines their wagers.
- stinkbeetle 6mo agoThanks. A1 and A2 didn't answer my questions except that I think you're saying that you are not sure if any it is true or not. I was hoping for something substantive beyond the usual conspiracy theorizing. On A3, money laundering doesn't mean hiding financial activity from the court of public opinion, it means to take an illegal income and put it through processes that obfuscates its origin and makes it difficult for law enforcement to notice or investigate so it can be used in legal markets. "Gambling" doesn't just clean money. Polymarket is electronic and the source and destination of transactions could be subpoenaed. That misconception probably comes from physical casinos where a person would walk in with cash and walk out with a receipt for chips and claim gambling earnings. Doesn't work when you have a paper trail in and out. It would be stupid to the point of ridiculous to try to launder money this way, even from Trump, lol. Especially on such visible trades! Much more likely it's just making money from insider bets, because that is seemingly not illegal for prediction markets. If you were going to try to use this thing to launder (which seems ridiculous in the first place but maybe it's possible) you would do it with much more mundane bets surely. > The fact that obvious behavior like this happens reflects poorly on the platform. It’s pretty incredible that bettors are stupid enough to use a platform that actively undermines their wagers. Gambling is or can be a terrible mental health problem. Stupidity - arguably yes, but also an addiction. Which makes profiting from it pretty awful too really. Although regulations have struggled with how to deal with it because internet and black market gambling is so lucrative and easy to set up too unfortunately.
- OutOfHere 6mo agoIt can be said that Trump's "tweets" on that day were strategically engineered to first bring this bet to near zero before ultimately bring it to a hundred. In this way, the maximum winnings could be made by someone with insider knowledge.
- green_wheel 6mo agoI've tried to have sympathy for people who lose money gambling but I just can't. Maybe some argument can be made for the fool who loses money on something silly like a sports game, but people certainly not for people trying to make a buck off of death an destruction.
- CuriousRose 6mo agoOften people are under such mental pressures that the chance of a better financial outcome is more mentally digestible than the existing scenario they are in. Considering it from that perspective has allowed me to understand and empathise with the gambler. However irrational or unlikely a sliver of hope, it is a chance at hope nonetheless.
- Mr_Minderbinder 6mo ago> than the existing scenario they are in. In my personal experience that "scenario" is a wearisome but stable job with a good income that would afford a comfortable middle class lifestyle. Yet this unfortunate circumstance was so intolerable that they would rather risk, and have in fact realised, the complete financial ruin of themselves and the ruin of the prospects and happiness of their children than continue to suffer it. So I had little else other than contempt, for them and others like them, when they came to me asking for money.
- jmyeet 6mo agoSo I follow the oil and gas industry and markets. For anyone that doesn't know, commodity markets mostly operate two different markets: futures and spot. Futures contracts are an agreement to deliver (or take delivery, depending on which side you're on) a certain quantity of a standardized commodity at a given date. Futures markets tend to be a mix of speculators (who are simply betting on price movements of the underlying) and traders who produce or want the underlying. The advantage of a futures contract is it can allow someone to hedge their costs and lock-in prices. All sorts of producers and industries use them for that. Oil futures are standardized into several standard types (9 I think, I might be off). You will hear terms like West Texas crude and Brent. This refers to two main factors: the relative mix between lighter and heavier hydrocarbons (called the API gravity) in the oil as well as the sulfur content. One side benefit of all this is discovery. It's a way of measuring sentiment. So if future oil prices rise, it indicates market sentiment is negative about the war and they further disruption is expected. When it looks like hostilities may end, the price drops. But there's a problem: nobody trusts the market anymore. It's being manipulated as insiders are clearly frontrunning news with massive bets, sometimes minutes before news gets released. This has been happening with other markets too, most notably SPY futures. Markets cease to function once manipulation becomes widespread. The future price is also called the paper price and another signal that the paper price is meaningless is that the spot or physical price for oil has skyrocketed well beyond any oil prices you might see in the news. For example, a few weeks ago, physical Dubai oil was nearing $180 per barrel. West Texas crude had a future price of $110 yet the physical price was $140+. An issue here is that the physical price isn't easily discoverable. It's hidden behind subscription services that cost thousands so you only hear about it when it's reported on. But this means talking heads are reporting on $110 oil when it's really $150. We saw a similar mismatch with the silver market at the end of last year. That market too was clearly being manipulated but rather than insiders, many (including myself) suspect it was the refiners and others who had lost with silver's massive rally and were doing everything to pop the bubble, including changing the exchange's liquidity ratios to force sales. In previous years, some or all of these people would get investigated and prosecuted by the SEC for insider trading. That agency has been defanged by putting a pro-deregulation loyalist in charge but the bigger problem is that some or all of these people will be buying pardons before the president leaves office. And the president can no longer be prosecuted thanks to the Supreme Court inventing presidential immunity. One source of American power is the control over the global financial system. All of this insider trading risks dismantling that. It's not hard to find people who are sitting out because they simply don't trust anything anymore. If this spreads to financial institutions and institutional traders, that's going to be a big problem. So-called "prediction markets" (and crypto) are even less regulated than that. Unless you have insider knowledge or you're betting on something that isn't prone to insider information (and I honestly don't know what that would be), I'd stay away. And these prediction markets are small fry. SPY futures are a significantly larger market. So is oil and gas. And Treasuries is order of magnitudes bigger than either of those. Yet some of those markets can't be trusted and I suspect this is only going to get worse. I don't have any hope that anyone will ever be prosecuted for any of this.
- willio58 6mo agoCan someone explain to me how we haven’t regulated the hell out of the clearly illegal sector of betting on shit that can clearly be insider-traded with little to no scrutiny? Leaders? Are you awake at the wheel?
- spencerflem 6mo agoThey’re the ones doing it lol
- eli_gottlieb 6mo agoBecause they're the ones doing it and they have the power? Sorta inevitable outcome of markets in everything, really.
- baq 6mo agoWho do you think places those bets
- razorbeamz 6mo agoThe leaders are the ones profiting from it.
- tasuki 6mo agoI wanted to reply, but I think I just don't understand your comment at all. Are you saying the "sector of betting on shit that can clearly be insider-traded" is illegal? Does that include like gold and S&P500? The way I see it, prediction markets' main function is to connect gamblers with insiders posessing useful information. Are you concerned for the gamblers losing? But they were gonna lose anyway, one way or the other. Or are you concerned about the insiders winning? Sucks, but at least the public gets information by way of the prediction market being more accurate.
- mint5 6mo agoPlease Explain how a last minute insider info bet helps the public in any way or fashion aside from fleecing fools of their money?
- DaedalusII 6mo agoeveryone is assuming this is americans but what if it iranians or israelis or pakistan people . is not just white house cabinet in these rooms
- 1348ashg 6mo agoTrump Jr. is invested in Polymarket via 1789 Capital. So the Trump volatility by hourly policy reversals on "Truth" "Social" benefits the gambling industry as a whole as well as insider betting. Iran correctly figured out that by threatening the OpenAI data center, where the Kushner family has shares, could move Trump to call off the infrastructure strikes. Or it played a role at least. Maybe the strike is postponed until after the OpenAI IPO.
- scoofy 6mo agoPeople want very smart people to wager on future events to make public the best information possible. Okay, so when these super-predictors get fleece by insiders, then what? Having any uncertainty market where insider information is not considered cheating is a complete waste of time. The insiders will always win, everyone else will slowly lose even if they are smart as hell. Just imagine playing poker at a table where one in a thousand people can see all the hole cards. The entire game is for them to wait you to put all your money on the table when they already know the winning move. Even if you can win enough to stay in the game, they can take you for everything in one play when you get something wrong that you were very certain of.
- dmos62 6mo agoI guess this would be fine if there was no such thing as anonymous betting, right? Some public official weaseling his way onto a bet he has insider knowledge on is fine, as long as everyone knows that he's doing that. Or am I wrong? Edit: then again, in EU banks regularly force you to fill out a questionnaire where you declare whether or not you're affiliated or closely related to any public officials for precisely corruption prevention (or detection) purposes. Why are people not forced to do that on these platforms?
- scoofy 6mo agoThen get rid of it. Make it illegal or tax it to death. My point is that the entire premise of "why it's ackchyually good though" is wrong. The thesis is that the markets let intelligent agents flourish, adding value to the real world. When really, the insiders can be idiots and still win. We gain no new information because the insider has every incentive to hold off on their move until the very last minute, maximally reducing the effects of theta and vega, to maximize profit. This adds little to no practical information to the market while potentially removing super-predictors from the market. It just becomes a vehicle for insider-trading, so make that illegal, cancellable, or just get rid of the market altogether.
- soerxpso 6mo agoThis isn't useful information without also knowing how common it is for newly-created accounts to place and lose bets around that size. Polymarket is a large platform with a lot of accounts being created per day. If two accounts made large bets and won and eight accounts made large bets and lost, you haven't discovered anything interesting.
- edge_trader_41 6mo ago[flagged]