More than a dozen anonymous Polymarket accounts placed suspiciously well-timed bets in the hours before President Donald Trump launched strikes on Iran—and walked away with a combined $330,000 in profits.
The accounts, identified by the Financial Times, wagered a total of $66,993 that the White House would attack Iran by Saturday. Almost all the bets came within a 24-hour window before the bombs started falling.
Half the wagers were placed just six hours before the strikes began.
Of the 13 accounts behind the bets, 12 had been created within the past week.
“If a new wallet makes a very large bet on a single issue, you have to wonder why they’re doing that,” Matt Saincome, CEO of financial data provider Unusual Whales, told the FT. “We do see people do that who are wrong. But it makes you think, perhaps that’s an insider.”
The White House offered a non-denial denial. “The only special interest guiding the Trump Administration’s decision-making is the best interest of the American people,” spokesperson Davis Ingle said.
This isn’t the first time Polymarket accounts have made fortunes on Trump’s military actions with suspiciously perfect timing.
Before U.S. forces captured former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on January 3, the platform put odds of his removal at just 9 percent. Six accounts—created days before and showing no other betting activity—placed $9,807 on Maduro’s downfall and cashed out $133,878.
A seventh account placed $32,000 on other Maduro-related markets and netted $404,222 when the capture happened.
The pattern is hard to ignore: brand-new accounts, single-issue bets, astronomical returns, all timed perfectly to classified military operations. Either someone’s extraordinarily lucky, or someone knows things they shouldn’t.
Polymarket operates as a crypto-based prediction marketplace, which makes tracking the actual humans behind these accounts difficult—exactly the kind of opacity that would appeal to anyone looking to profit from inside information about impending military strikes.