Polymarket bets raise insider trading concerns

A Polymarket trader made around $320,000 by correctly betting on former US President Joe Biden’s last-minute pardons with near-perfect timing, raising concerns about potential insider knowledge.

The profits came from two linked wallets that placed high-risk bets with low odds and achieved a 100% success rate across multiple pardon-related markets.

“For suspicious trades we search for the pattern of big, well-timed bets across several connected wallets,”

Said a Bubblemaps analyst.

The wallets correctly predicted several pardons, including those of Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, Adam Schiff and Jim Biden, often placing bets when odds were as low as 6% shortly before the announcements.

One wager of about $21,700 on Jim Biden returned nearly $198,000 within minutes, highlighting the scale and precision of the trades. Following the announcement the Polymarket activity was unchanged at $XX.

The activity has intensified scrutiny of prediction markets and their potential exposure to insider trading, particularly around political events with market-moving implications.

Regulators and policymakers are increasingly under pressure to investigate such trades, as similar patterns have emerged in recent months across political and financial betting platforms.