In the early hours of March 23, a remarkable flurry of trades took place in global oil markets. Between 6:49 and 6:50 a.m., over $580 million of Brent and West Texas Intermediate futures were bought and sold, just minutes before President Trump announced on Truth Social that airstrikes on Iran’s power plants would be postponed. Within minutes of the statement at 7:04 a.m., oil prices collapsed, creating enormous profits for whoever had placed the well-timed bets. The timing has prompted accusations that those with privileged access to White House deliberations may have profited from confidential information about military plans.
Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, did not mince words. “The people that made those bets at 6:50 a.m. were either members of Trump’s family, or they were people who worked in the White House, or maybe they were just traders who got a phone call from their friend in the White House,” he said. “This is astounding corruption.” The White House, however, denied any wrongdoing. Spokesman Kush Desai stated, “The White House does not tolerate any administration official illegally profiteering off of insider knowledge, and any implication that officials are engaged in such activity without evidence is baseless and irresponsible reporting.”
Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, writing on Substack, described the events in stronger terms. He argued that exploiting confidential information about national security, such as imminent bombing plans, for personal gain “has another word: treason.” The oil futures trades, coupled with other instances of suspiciously timed investments, have intensified scrutiny of the Trump administration’s relationship with financial markets, particularly in the volatile environment surrounding the Iran conflict.
One high-profile case involves Pete Hegseth, the US Secretary of Defense. According to the Financial Times, Hegseth’s broker at Morgan Stanley contacted BlackRock about investing in its defense fund shortly before the US and Israel attacked Iran. The fund included stocks in major Pentagon contractors like Lockheed Martin, Palantir, and Northrop Grumman, which could have benefited from increased defense spending. Hegseth did not invest personally, and the fund ultimately lost money during the conflict. The Pentagon dismissed the report as a “baseless, dishonest smear,” with spokesman Sean Parnell reaffirming the department’s commitment to ethics and compliance with all applicable laws.
The oil futures scandal is not an isolated incident. Anonymous prediction markets, such as Polymarket and Kalshi, allow traders to wager on global events using cryptocurrency, making it easier than ever to profit from knowledge of imminent geopolitical developments. For instance, on February 27, just before US and Israeli attacks on Iran, hundreds of bets totaling approximately $855,000 accurately predicted the war’s start, generating substantial gains for the lucky few. Similarly, in January, a Polymarket user staked $32,000 hours before US forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and won $400,000 after the operation’s success.
Experts note that these markets make it difficult to trace suspicious activity definitively, but the timing and scale of the trades suggest that insiders may have had prior knowledge of unfolding events. Eric Zitzewitz, an economist at Dartmouth College specializing in prediction markets, said, “There are a couple of instances where it looks like somebody probably knew something a couple hours before everyone else did and traded on it. I think this is clearest on Polymarket, where you can effectively get account-level trading, so you can know that this big spike in volume was all one person.”
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan are reportedly investigating these trades, though it remains uncertain whether regulatory agencies have the appetite to pursue cases. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is led by Michael Selig, a 36-year-old former crypto trader appointed by Trump, while the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is chaired by Paul Atkins, another Trump appointee with ties to the cryptocurrency industry. Internal frustration within the SEC has already surfaced. Margaret Ryan, a senior official in the SEC’s enforcement division, resigned after six months, citing her inability to pursue alleged fraud cases involving the president’s circle. Reuters reported that Ryan faced resistance from Atkins and other top political appointees, though the SEC maintains that enforcement decisions are “based on facts, the law and policy, not on politics.”
The implications of these allegations are serious. If insiders were indeed exploiting confidential information about military operations for profit, it could represent not only a financial scandal but a potential national security risk, as sensitive operational plans may have been effectively disclosed to financial markets. The episode also raises broader ethical questions about the intersection of politics, war, and finance in an era of real-time trading and anonymous prediction markets.
As reported by The Times UK, the timing of these trades has reignited debates over transparency and accountability in Washington, highlighting how the combination of high-speed markets, cryptocurrency platforms, and privileged information can create opportunities for profit that were previously unimaginable. Lawmakers, economists, and legal experts are closely watching developments, even as the White House maintains that there is no evidence of wrongdoing.
