US EditionTraders bet $500 million on oil price just before Trump's post on delay to Iran attack
Traders placed $580 million in oil futures bets minutes before Trump's Iran announcement, raising concerns of possible insider trading and market manipulation, amid a volatile geopolitical climate.
- On Monday, roughly $580 million in oil futures traded between 6:49 and 6:50 a.m. New York time, just 15 minutes before President Donald Trump announced a five-day pause on strikes against Iranian energy infrastructure.
- Over the weekend, Trump had threatened to 'obliterate' Iran's power plants if the Strait of Hormuz remained closed, setting the stage for sharp market moves when trading resumed Monday.
- Market analysts described the volume surge as 'really abnormal,' prompting Senator Chris Murphy to ask, 'Who was it? A White House staffer?' and call the activity 'corruption.'
- Iranian officials denied any negotiations, calling Trump's claims 'fake news' designed to manipulate markets, while pressure mounts for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to investigate.
- Lawmakers introduced bipartisan legislation to ban wagering on government actions and war, as prediction market Polymarket faces scrutiny for similar suspicious betting patterns on military operations.
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161 Articles
Democrats call for oil market trades to be investigated for insider trading
There's a growing political row over hundreds of millions of dollars of trades in the oil market, which took place on Monday, just minutes before President Trump revealed he was postponing military strikes on Iranian energy plants.
Even before US President Donald Trump announced on Monday that he would postpone attacks on Iranian energy infrastructure, there was an unusually large trading session in oil stocks, with the movement reaching $1.5 billion. According to some politicians and analysts, it appears that the trading may have been based on non-public information.
This mysterious 15 minutes smacks of insane corruption in Trump's orbit
Friends,Margaret Ryan, the top enforcement official at the Securities and Exchange Commission — the agency tasked with investigating insider trading and other illegal activities in financial markets — abruptly resigned last week, after just six months on the job.Reportedly, Ryan wanted to be more aggressive in pursuing charges of fraud and other misconduct, including against Trump’s inner circle. But the SEC’s chairman, Paul Atkins, and other Re…
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