Headline: Congress Demands Probe After 50 New Polymarket Accounts Bet on Iran Ceasefire Minutes Before Trump’s Post
Policymakers are calling for answers after a flurry of suspicious activity on Polymarket: at least 50 newly created accounts placed substantial bets on a US-Iran ceasefire in the hours—and crucially, in the minutes—before President Trump posted about the deal on social media on April 9. Most of those accounts had no prior betting history and made no other trades before or since, prompting allegations of possible insider trading on the crypto-based prediction market.
NPR first reported the pattern, which immediately drew congressional attention. Representative Ritchie Torres has sent a letter to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) demanding a formal investigation. Senator Richard Blumenthal labeled Polymarket “an illicit market to sell and exploit national security secrets unlike any in history,” escalating political scrutiny of prediction markets that trade on geopolitical events.
This episode echoes an earlier controversy: six Polymarket accounts were accused of using insider information to profit from the timing of prior US strikes on Iran, reportedly netting roughly $1 million. Analytics firm Bubblemaps had flagged newly created wallets placing timely bets hours before those strikes. The latest activity appears even more striking because bets were placed in the minutes leading up to the public announcement, not just hours earlier.
Regulatory pressure is already mounting. The CFTC issued an advance notice of proposed rulemaking on prediction markets in March 2026, with the public comment window scheduled to close on April 30. Meanwhile, more than 10 anti-prediction-market bills have been introduced in Congress since January. In a related push, six Democratic senators previously urged the CFTC to prohibit contracts that resolve on or correlate to an individual’s death—a legislative response fueled in part by concerns over so-called “death betting.”
Polymarket, which operates outside U.S. jurisdiction and requires only a crypto wallet to trade, has not responded publicly to the latest congressional demands. As lawmakers and regulators weigh potential action, the incident raises renewed questions about transparency, market manipulation, and the challenges of policing decentralized prediction markets that touch on national security.
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