The alleged $400,000 insider bet by a Green Beret on a Venezuela raid may be just the tip of the iceberg. A new report by the Anti-Corruption Data Collective (ACDC) analyzed over 435,000 markets and $54.4 billion in cumulative volume on Polymarket, revealing that low-probability bets on military and defense outcomes have success rates that are difficult to explain by skill or luck alone.
These "longshot" bets typically succeed around 14% of the time across political markets, but in military-linked contracts, they have topped 50% in some cases. The authors suggest that markets tied to specific government policies, such as military and defense, are more susceptible to information asymmetries, including insider trading or specialized knowledge.
In these markets, a small group of traders can consistently outperform others by having access to confidential information. The report's findings add to a growing body of research indicating that a small percentage of traders account for most price discovery on Polymarket, with separate analysis showing that profits are highly concentrated, with fewer than 1% of wallets capturing about half of all gains. The ACDC report examines the June 2025 U.S. strikes on Iran as a case study, finding that 19 longshot bets totaling $164,292 were placed in the hours leading up to the strike, with eight wallets sharing about $1.8 million in profits.
The pattern extends beyond a single event, with winning longshot bets outnumbering losing ones in five of the six two-hour windows before market resolution, contrary to what market prices imply. The report recommends identity verification for bettors, conditional payouts on suspicious wagers, restrictions on markets whose outcomes are decided by small groups, and limits on how granular contracts can become, calling for an evidence-informed debate about whether the public should be betting on these outcomes at all.