Observers are once again raising concerns about insider trading on Wednesday after one trader took a huge oil oil the short position just over an hour before a US-Iran peace deal was reported to be on the horizon, sending prices tumbling.
Kobeissi Letters, a financial newsletter, reported at X that at 3:40 a.m. Wednesday, “approximately 10,000 contracts worth of crude oil oil the shorts were taken without any big news.”
This was equivalent to $920 million in notional value, which the letter described as “an extremely large trade” so early in the morning. But it would soon pay off.
At 4:50 a.m., just 70 minutes later, Axios published an exclusive scoop from Middle East reporter Barak Ravid se The White House believed the US and Iran were on the verge of agreeing to a one-page “memorandum of understanding” to end the war, which included more nuclear negotiations, one of the key sticking points for US President Donald Trump.
By 7:00 a.m., just over two hours after Axios dropped its report, oil prices had fallen 12%, allowing the savvy investor to make $125 million in a few hours, leading to accusations that it was another example of “epic insider trading” by those privy to Trump’s plans.
Prices have since risen by around 8% behind Iran DESIGNATED the creation of a new “Persian Gulf Straits Authority” to mediate the passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz on its own terms.
of The Trump administration has already been inundated with allegations that its members are using inside information to profit from financial markets and market forecasting applications.
Last month, he was an active-duty US special forces soldier unsuspecting BY Department of Justice after he made an estimated $400,000 bet on Polymarket that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro would be ousted from power, a bet he allegedly placed using classified information about an operation in which he himself was involved.
More bets collected about $1 million in winnings from betting on the specific timing of Trump’s war with Iran in late February. Financial Times too reported a rise of more than $580 million in oil futures just before Trump announced a pause in attacks on Iran’s energy facilities in March.
Of course, Wednesday’s bet could theoretically have been made without the help of insider information.
The new peace framework is the latest in what appears to be one endless pattern over the past few weeks in which US officials tell the media that a peace deal is on the horizon, causing oil prices to fall, only for them to collapse later in the week, often with Trump giving up hostile threats OR making new demands.
It has become such a popular story that some have done it speculated that the announcement of productive ceasefire talks is deliberately choreographed to calm oil markets and lower prices, which have become a growing problem for Trump among voters.
But like The Economic Times is explainedthe bet placed on Wednesday morning is likely “not a routine hedge” or “a portfolio rebalancing move”.
“At that hour, at that size,” he said, “a small crude of that size is a deliberate bet, run with high conviction.”
Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), a Trump cheerleader who has become one of his leading critics, suggested that Trump’s erratic approach to negotiating an end to the war was just a tool used by him and his allies to gain advantage.
“When is everyone going to start realizing that the rhetoric of war/peace again, again, is really just insider trading? And sprinkle in some murder,” Greene has written IN social media. “Only a select few in the highest tax bracket are benefiting from this and most of you are not in it.”
Democrats in Congress have asked the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that investigate what Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) suggested it can be “out of mind cORRUPTION” from the White House, not only related to Trump’s wars, but also to his tariff regime, which has caused similar market chaos that bettors have been able to capitalize on with random bets.
But critics have described profiting from the machinations of a war that has killed more than 1700 civilians as particularly grotesque.
“This has to stop” said Fox News commentator Jessica Tarlov. “Live online so you can trade insiders!”
