Trump Criticizes the World as a "Casino" but Frequently Engages in "Pump and Dump" Schemes: Preemptive Policy Actions Raise Market Manipulation Suspicions

BlockBeats News, April 24th: U.S. President Trump publicly criticized geopolitical speculation, saying "the world has become a casino." However, the reality has seen repeated instances of "well-timed" trades, raising concerns in the market about policy information leakage and potential manipulation.

The latest case involves a U.S. soldier involved in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Hours before Trump announced the operation, the soldier bet over $33,000 on the prediction market Polymarket and ultimately made a profit of over $400,000. He has since been arrested by the U.S. authorities, and the case has been classified as a typical "prediction market insider trading."

Of greater concern is the "collective sprint" in the commodity market. At several key junctures, crude oil and stock index futures saw massive trades minutes to hours before Trump's policy shifts (ceasefires, delayed strikes, etc.). For example:

· On April 7th, around 3:45 p.m. Eastern Time, within two minutes, over 15 million barrels of crude oil futures (about $17 billion) were traded. Three hours later, Trump announced a ceasefire, leading to a sharp oil price drop and stock market rebound;
· On March 23rd, 16 minutes before announcing the postponement of strikes against Iran, billions of dollars worth of crude oil and stock index futures had already changed hands.

These trades, due to their "perfect timing," have attracted regulatory scrutiny. The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has initiated an investigation under political pressure, with several lawmakers pointing directly to these trades being "difficult to explain as mere luck."

Despite the White House denying any official's use of insider information for profit and emphasizing no evidence of government officials violating rules, internal warnings have been issued to prohibit trading based on non-public information.

Meanwhile, prediction markets and event-based derivatives have rapidly expanded, exacerbating the issue of information asymmetry. Data shows that geopolitical bets on Polymarket have surged to $560 million in a single week, becoming one of the fastest-growing sectors.

Overall, from on-chain prediction markets to traditional futures markets, the pattern of "policy signal → fund rush → price volatility" has repeatedly appeared. The Trump administration's foreign policy decision-making pace is increasingly seen by the market as a tradable "source of information."