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) has analyzed over 435,000 Polymarket contracts and $54.4 billion in cumulative volume, uncovering unusually high win rates for low-probability bets on military and defense outcomes. These success rates, which have topped 50% in some cases, are difficult to explain through skill or luck alone.
The report suggests that markets tied to government policies, such as military and defense, are more susceptible to information asymmetries, including insider trading or specialized knowledge. This creates conditions in which a small group of informed traders can consistently outperform others.
The findings add to a growing body of research pointing to a small group of traders driving price discovery and capturing a disproportionate share of profits on Polymarket. The report examines the June 2025 U.S. strikes on Iran as a case study, where a small number of traders placed large, well-timed bets on the outcome, despite the operation being designed to be unreadable from the outside. 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.
The consistency of these patterns suggests that some participants may be operating with information advantages that others do not have. 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. Ultimately, the report calls for an evidence-informed debate about whether the public should be betting on these outcomes at all.