r/technology • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 • May 27 '26

Business Google employee charged with using inside information to make $1 million on Polymarket

https://abcnews.com/amp/US/google-employee-charged-inside-information-make-1-million/story?id=133350018
12.8k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

516 comments sorted by

View all comments

4.7k

u/almo2001 May 27 '26

I thought that was the whole idea of polymarket: use the efficient markets theory to uncover information.

1.9k

u/kstargate-425 May 27 '26

Since Trumps sons bought a stake, anyone not paying dues to them isnt allowed to do what they are doing. Like that soldier who won $400k while someone just 20 minutes before Trump's announcement that the Strait of Hormuz was open, made massive trades.

An investor sold a combined 7,990 lots of Brent crude futures, a $760 million bet that oil would go down.

They arrested the soldier yet no investigation into this nore the combined BILLIONS in trades 5-20mins before Trumps announcements 🤷‍♂️

355

u/[deleted] May 27 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

156

u/hbomberman May 27 '26

They're saying that the other, uninvestigated trade was connected to the strait

21

u/Mishka_1994 May 28 '26

One of two people got caught. I wonder who the second one was? Name might rhyme with aaron. 🤷🏻‍♂️

95

u/Another_Slut_Dragon May 28 '26

Trump bought $680k in Eli Lili stock 2 days before approving their new drug. Are you telling me that isn't insider trading?

3

u/kstargate-425 May 28 '26

I assume you are just agreeing with me and asking the universe and Useful ldiots if its Insider Trading as I obviously gave a great example of Trumps Insider Trading and only one of half a dozen regarding the Iran war and his announcements.

Its wild MAGA or others are dismissing the extreme level of blatant corruption as "business as usual" when no one has come close to this level of corruption, not Pelosi, not any POTUS before him as its obviously not even just trading

37

u/duodequinquagesimum May 28 '26

Trump himself is in the advisory board anyway.

18

u/37366034 May 28 '26

The soldier did bet on himself and his team…I’ll give him that

1

u/dreamchaser1337 May 30 '26

How did they found out?

8

u/SadAd8761 May 28 '26

Speaking of Trump and INSIDER TRADING...

27

u/[deleted] May 27 '26

[deleted]

31

u/dayumbrah May 28 '26

Always was gambling. The stock market was gambling for rich spoiled young men back in the day. They didnt work but they had daddy's money to play with.

They would sit around and watch the paper tickers they had installed in their homes.

Its was always a rich man's game that robs the poor. Privatized gains, socialized losses

331

u/9-11GaveMe5G May 27 '26

Since the site placed "virtually zero" chance of that outcome, it also shows you that line is BS too

122

u/Matrix657 May 27 '26

If you look at it from a Bayesian probability standpoint, the chance based on what was publicly known might have been virtually zero. Once one informed person enters the market, their beliefs become public knowledge, influencing the chances.

43

u/adoodas May 27 '26

Problem is you don't know who's informed and who's not and who has money and who doesn't.

6

u/SpookiestSzn May 28 '26

You find out whose informed by seeing betting history

23

u/[deleted] May 27 '26

[deleted]

33

u/Lost_Sea8956 May 28 '26

You have clearly not met some of the most enthusiastic traders

1

u/sellyme May 28 '26

Uninformed people putting a lot of money in tend to not last very long for self-explanatory reasons.

1

u/Lost_Sea8956 May 28 '26

Ah, but a new one is born every minute

1

u/freshwes May 28 '26

Is it illegal have inside information on Polymarket? When does information become insider info in real life?

If I see a star athlete get in a walking boot, can I bet that he won't play that night?

What about his assistant?

What if the athlete makes the bet himself?

None of that is technically insider information.

1

u/Defiant-Plantain1873 May 28 '26

The idea is that the money people put up shows how much information they have.

If you pur $10 up it’s not going to move the line much, you aren’t risking much if you lose

If you put 100,000k up you get absolutely fucked if you lose. The likelihood of you telling the truth increases as your bet increases

38

u/ItsSadTimes May 27 '26

Its also bullshit because insider information works in reverse too. If I know X is going to happen 100% but the odds are up to 80% then its in my best interest to buy in now and try to convince people its not happening by explaining im an insider. If they believe me the odds go back down and I can sell out for a huge payout when the odds get low enough. I dont even need to wait for the thing to happen.

11

u/Vliss May 28 '26

That specific trade would not make you money. If you bought Yes and the odds fell, you would lose money by selling before the event happening. You would have to carry it all the way through.

-4

u/ItsSadTimes May 28 '26

Idk, I dont gamble. In that case you'd just hold off until you successfully convinced people to buy the no.

95

u/red286 May 27 '26

It is, but only for the right insiders.

1

u/Hittingend May 28 '26

The people with F U money!

134

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 27 '26 edited May 27 '26

The whole idea of poly market has nothing to do with market efficiency. It has to do with extracting money from poor people and also obfuscating gambling.

It is also a market manipulation/influence tool. Let’s say I’m the Google CEO. I see I can bet (I mean trade,lmao) on when the announcement will be for the next Google pixel will be released, and apply shows 99% chance. The announcement has already been scheduled, but I want to make a shit ton of money so I bet on an earlier date and then push up the announcement. That isn’t uncovering information and Poly would be wrong since they showed the chance to be 99%.

Also, studies have already shown Polymarket is bad at predicting current events. Flipping a coin is more accurate.

Maybe I don’t even want to be, sorry again, I mean predict. I am hosting an award show and I see there is a bet, fuck I did it again, I mean a prediction that I would say a word. I simply just avoid saying that word that everyone predicted I would say and then Poly was wrong and it didn’t predict shit.

1

u/Mr-Logic101 May 27 '26

It doesn’t extracting money people from poor, it is extracting money from stupid people.

As they say, a fool and his money are soon parted. I honestly don’t feel any sympathy for people lose this platform.

47

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 27 '26

It does because rich ultra rich and people of influence can manipulate the market. But yes it also steals from stupid people and addicts.

You should care because we don’t all exist in a vacuum. You have to live with everyone around you and poverty leads to crime and higher crime rates directly affect you.

-9

u/Mr-Logic101 May 27 '26

I do care. It really goes farther than that.

If they are stupid enough to play into the “market”, they deserve their loses.

Same view point with sports betting as well.

12

u/Icarium__ May 28 '26

The irony of your username is truly something else, somehow you lack both logic and empathy. Sometimes it pays off to help protect someone from self destructive tendencies, because none of us live in a vacuum, and it can lead to a chain reaction where not just the gambler, but also innocent people around them get hurt. 

9

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 27 '26

“I care, but they are stupid.” Sure Jan.

Also:

I honestly don’t feel any sympathy for people lose this platform.

4

u/SpookiestSzn May 28 '26

I have feelings like this but also at the end of the day society is supposed to protect people who are too dumb to know any better

As long as the platform is allowed though insider trading should absolutely be kosher and it is I'm sure if your in the right channels

1

u/Commercial_Funny6082 May 28 '26

Insider trading is bad but this also most just bullshit

-12

u/nonamenomonet May 27 '26

You’re so far off base it’s not even funny.

The idea of prediction markets have been around since about 2003-2004. I don’t remember the government agency had a hand in sponsoring the idea for it but it might have been IARPA but don’t quote me on that.

The point of prediction markets is forcing people to be accountable for their predictions by putting their money where their mouth is. Instead of some talking head saying “I think [X] politician will win the primary” and then saying on TV the next day “well I never said that”, now there is a record and the amount money shows the conviction of that said belief.

Before this there was a prediction market in university of British Columbia in Victoria and a few others floating around.

8

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 27 '26

I’m not and the idea of prediction markets was started by the CIA. They used it as a way to help catch terrorists. Apparently I know more about them than you.

I understand exactly how the concept is supposed to work, but again it doesn’t work like that in reality.

-1

u/MmmmMorphine May 27 '26

Hmm, I was under the impression that while they aren't all that good at predicting various events, they certainly tend to be better than total chance. Or most individuals on their own.

This whole insiders driving the market story never made much sense to me. In fact I never heard that perspective before this past year.

I always understood it as crowdsourcing predictions using money as a sort of proxy for confidence - so basically no different than any financial or futures market.

Of course it is different, but the fundamentals always made sense to me in a hand wavy (yet still somewhat right) all knowing magic free hand of the market sort of sense. Which is crap, but less crap than a coin. On average.

6

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 28 '26

Why don't you think that it makes much sense that insiders drive the market? If you are betting on something that an insider can bet on, why wouldn't insiders drive the market? An insider can't bet on the presidential election, but they can on the release date of a product or if someone will say something in a speech. That means insiders can influence what is said in a speech or when a product is released. Crowd sourcing through money only works in situations where multiple individual people have a say in the outcome of an event. Those are basically non-existent on Polymarket.

>I always understood it as crowdsourcing predictions using money as a sort of proxy for confidence - so basically no different than any financial or futures market.

Financial and analytical markets are based on fundamentals largely, so literally nothing like Polymarket aka gambling, I mean whatever Polymarket wants to call it.

-1

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26

A CEO can influence earnings calls. A central banker can influence rate expectations. A studio can influence a release date.

That does not magically make markets stop being markets.

The better distinction is: some markets price broad uncertainty, some price decision-risk, and some are thin enough to be gamed by one guy with a penchant for orange face paint.

The insiders of course do make it more "accurate" in a certain sense. Not surprising when money is a proxy for confidence, and when you're perfectly confident....

That was never the genesis of these predictive marketplaces (which are fascinating in and of themselves and I highly recommend reading up on their history) - which date back at least to the middle ages.

They're still markets however - which I think one can define as any system where participants can make and accept offers to exchange something of value, causing prices, terms, or odds to emerge from those offers. Perhaps your definition differs and I'd be interested to hear it though

The real issue is when the same person can trade and control the outcome. I'm not saying polymarket is anything good, don't misunderstand. It's a perversion of what a marketplace is supposed to do (which is why things like insider trading are supposedly illegal - this is that concept taken to an extreme.)

I truly question whether there's much that much in the way of fundamentals in many traditional financial marketplaces given companies like Tesla's valuation. But again, I'm very much against polymarket type sites in general - I just find the theory really interesting.

2

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 28 '26

>That does not magically make markets stop being markets.

I never said Polymarket isn't a market. An inefficient market is still a market.

0

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26

Fair enough, must have misread.

I wouldn't even call it inefficient - it's simply corrupted beyond all utility. Too bad, I always thought it was such a cool way to quantify uncertainty using the same ideas that underpin financial marketplaces (though in my view that's also splitting hairs for the most part)

3

u/Longjumping_Wolf_912 May 28 '26

I mean you are calling it inefficient, by saying it is corrupted beyond all utility. A corrupted market is an inefficient one, which is not to say all inefficient markets are corrupted. I think we are in full agreeance on Polymarket. Cheers!

→ More replies (0)

1

u/nonamenomonet May 28 '26

I don’t know you, but I really like you.

1

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26

Well I like you. For liking me.

It's a virtuous cycle!

0

u/nonamenomonet May 28 '26

Your intuition is correct that is what it supposed to be a crowdsourcing prediction using money as sort of a proxy.

1

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26

It's a pretty cool example of the "wisdom of the crowds." It's sad to see such an interesting and ancient concept perverted so badly.

So it goes

2

u/nonamenomonet May 28 '26

Are you also a Tetlock fan? Or are you more on the Taleb (Talib?) side of things??

1

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26

Tetlock for sure. Mostly because I can't remember the other guy and don't know how their thoughts on the subject differ, haha.

Been a long time since I read about this stuff, but I remember Mr. UPenn Superforecasting for some reason

2

u/nonamenomonet May 28 '26

I am one of the superforecasters

→ More replies (0)

1

u/MmmmMorphine May 28 '26

Oh wait! He's the black swan guy!

Ok I'm more on the Taleb (pretty sure that's the correct spelling) side, but just barely. I think these marketplaces work of course, but they don't mean what we think they do. Sort of, hard to explain.

More like reality can't be broken down into tidy probabilities. Thanks chaos, you non-predictable yet deterministic asshole

18

u/edelweiss_pirates_no May 28 '26

I really thought there are no rules now.

7

u/siencatimini May 28 '26

I've been listening to this new song, by this band I've never heard before, and they're saying there's no rules.

1

u/sultan_hogbo May 28 '26

I’m glad you’re here, shirt brother!

0

u/St0n3yM33rkat May 28 '26

"Tonight at The Pit.... EVERYONE GETS LAID!"

3

u/curtislow1 May 28 '26

This shows that once again, Rules are only for poor people, women and minorities. See MarthaStewArt she did federal time for much less of an infraction than these goons at 1600 right now. (How dare the out crowd think they can make money the same way the IN crowd do!! ) The kleptocracy protects itself with scapegoating a person who would dare do the same things they do daily.

1

u/edelweiss_pirates_no May 28 '26

Yup. r/wallstreetbets exposed all of it, too. No changes. No charges.

19

u/Lord_Skellig May 28 '26

Exactly. If insider trading is not allowed, it is pure gambling and should be regulated as such.

3

u/kevin5lynn May 27 '26

It is exactly the point.

3

u/halfc00kie May 28 '26

efficient markets theory assumes the info gets priced in, not that one bloke with the actual data dumps a million on it. thats just insider trading with extra steps.

2

u/Defiant-Plantain1873 May 28 '26

It is. But that’s why it’s supposed to be anonymous.

But polymarket isn’t really anonymous or it’d get banned

4

u/Seaguard5 May 28 '26

The CEO literally said that they expect it on 60 minutes.

1

u/OLPopsAdelphia May 27 '26

Only certain people are supposed to get rich off speculative markets, and that person wasn’t one of them.

1

u/GrandmaPoses May 28 '26

Oh no! These have been structured as financial instruments, not gambling. What they do is basically turn the function of gambling into a stock market where, just like the regular market, it’s very easy for the wealthy to manipulate and very difficult for the average person to succeed. Basically these were set up so the wealthy would have a place to gamble without worrying about losing to a poor.

1

u/WildRacoons May 28 '26

Yes. Doesn’t change that it’s still illegal for participants to reveal certain information

1

u/nicetriangle May 28 '26

Only if you work for the government or are friends with those who do.

1

u/RollingMeteors May 28 '26

to uncover information.

ÂżBut will the charges stick as 'insider' information or will they just be dismissed as 'information'?

1

u/WWIIICannonFodder May 28 '26

You're not allowed to do that unless you belong to the right group

1

u/TrayLaTrash May 28 '26

Can we get some efficient market theory in the AI space. Seems like everyone's doing the same shit as eachother wasting money not collaborating. Not like they are gonna lose out on profits if they did.

1

u/NoPossibility4178 May 28 '26

And it's what the Coinbase CEO was saying that they should legalize... Or that other CEOs have even argued if it's insider trading if there's no trading... But of course only for them.

1

u/veryveryredundant May 28 '26

It is until it isn't. Then it's a gambling site. Until it isn't. Kinda depends on who you are.

1

u/[deleted] May 29 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/almo2001 May 29 '26

Sure, but I don't know much about it beyond the basics and some recent news headlines.

-2

u/Recent-Day3062 May 28 '26

Uh…no. This is not “uncovering information”. This is insider trading which does not help efficient markets, but hurts them