The alleged insider trading incident involving a Green Beret's $400,000 bet on a Venezuelan raid may be just the tip of the iceberg. A recent analysis by the Anti-Corruption Data Collective (ACDC) of over 435,000 Polymarket contracts and $54.4 billion in cumulative volume from January 2021 to mid-March 2026 has uncovered unusually high win rates for low-probability bets on military and defense outcomes, with some success rates exceeding 50%. This is significantly higher than the typical 14% success rate for such bets in political markets. The researchers suggest that these markets are more susceptible to information asymmetries, including insider trading and specialized knowledge, which can create an uneven playing field.
The study's findings are consistent with previous research indicating that a small group of traders, approximately 3%, drive price discovery on Polymarket, while fewer than 1% of wallets capture about half of all gains. The ACDC report examines the June 2025 U.S.
strikes on Iran as a case study, where 19 longshot bets totaling $164,292 were placed in the hours leading up to the strike, resulting in profits of about $1.8 million for eight wallets. The report's authors propose several recommendations, including identity verification for bettors, conditional payouts on suspicious wagers, and restrictions on markets whose outcomes are decided by small groups. Ultimately, the report calls for a debate on whether the public should be allowed to bet on these outcomes at all, given the potential for insider trading and information asymmetry.