A newly created prediction-market account places a $30,000 and then walks away with $436,760 when the bet hits. This is not a hedge, nor is it a harmless side hustle. It is a flashing warning light for any organization that still treats insider trading as a brokerage-account problem.
As discussed on Ethicast Reacts, the flash point was an anonymous Polymarket account that put roughly $30,000 on a contract tied to Nicolás Maduro being out of office by January 31, 2026. The wagers were placed in the hours before President Donald Trump announced an overnight U.S. raid in Caracas on January 3, 2026 that resulted in Maduro’s capture and removal from the country. That $30,000 position later paid out about $436,000.
The specifics of the situation matter, but the bigger point is the channel. Prediction markets make it easy to monetize information that was never meant to be monetized, and that changes what inside information risk looks like in 2026.
What matters for E&C leaders
Insider trading just quickly expanded beyond securities
Prediction markets work like a hybrid of investment markets and prop betting: people buy yes/no positions on uncertain outcomes.
That means the scope of “tradable” nonpublic information expands from earnings and M&A into a much wider set of corporate realities: product timing, leadership decisions, and other outcomes that aren’t traded on an exchange but still move reputations, relationships, and strategy.
Erica Salmon Byrne, Chief Strategy Officer of Ethisphere, describes the core mechanism as “that overlapping place of I know something and I can make money using the thing I know.”
If your policy language and training still imply “inside information = securities trading,” you may be leaving the door wide open for other kinds of inside information risk.
Anonymity changes the deterrence math
Rules can easily be forgotten when temptation meets low friction. As discussed on Ethicast Reacts, bettors with a VPN and a crypto account can bet anonymously, and if they cover their tracks reasonably well, they can profit from something that nobody else knows.
That’s a different operating environment than traditional insider trading, where identity, brokerage controls, and surveillance create natural choke points. Here, the potential payoff is immediate, the product is simple, and the perceived chance of getting caught can feel abstract, especially to employees who don’t see themselves as insiders.
Don’t let “information discovery” rhetoric rewrite your ethics standard
Of particular interest, when it comes to preventing the use of insider information is the notion put forth by prediction markets themselves that trading on inside information eliminates biase and surfaces material hidden details on an uncertain outcome. Put simply: since prediction markets like Polymarket see insider trading is a feature and not a bug, E&C leaders need to respond with a clear ethical line, rather than with a philosophical debate.
Salmon Byrne grounds the line in the same principle financial markets use: fairness. “We don’t want people winning and losing money based on information that is not in the public domain.”
She adds the practical distinction your workforce can understand: betting on something anyone could see is one thing, but betting on information you got because of your job is entirely different because that involves basic stewardship of company assets.
Regulation may lag. Your controls need to lead.
The episode also makes a hard point: waiting for regulators to “fix” prediction-market misuse is not a plan. Salmon Byrne calls prevention “a really thorny problem” and argues compliance teams shouldn’t expect regulators to catch up quickly.
Until then, organizations still own inside information risk. You have to decide who gets access, what boundaries exist, and what consequences mean in practice.
The questions boards and regulators will ask
Now is a good time to treat the Maduro Polymarket bet as a rehearsal. If a “suspiciously timed” bet ever points back toward your organization, expect blunt questions that won’t stay in the compliance lane.
- Who had access to the information and how broad was that circle (including contractors, auditors, agencies, and vendors)?
- Did we explicitly treat this as confidential company information, or was it handled casually?
- Does our insider trading guidance actually cover betting and prediction markets, or only securities?
- Are we training only “traditional insiders,” or the larger employee base that can now be tempted?
- What do we do when we suspect misuse? Who investigates, how quickly, and with what proof standard?
- How do we handle high-stakes information when external parties learn it early? (The episode notes two newspapers withheld reporting due to troop-risk concerns—an example of a profession-specific ethos that doesn’t automatically exist inside corporations.)
- Can we explain the “why” in business terms: reputation, trust, and intangible assets; without sounding moralistic?
These are governance questions. If you can’t answer them crisply, you’re missing a story about control.
How to pressure-test your program this week
Run a “bettable outcomes” inventory
Ask a simple question that Salmon Byrne raises directly: “Are there things my company is doing that someone would be tempted to bet on?”
Start with scenarios such as:
- Product launches
- Significant mergers and acquisition outcomes
- CEO succession battles (and other leadership outcomes)
Remember, you’re not predicting crimes. You’re identifying temptation points.
Expand “insider” beyond your usual list
The Maduro-Polymarket episode flags what many programs miss: inside-information risk may involve a larger employee base than the people you typically train for insider trading.
Pressure-test whether your current approach over-focuses on finance teams, executive assistants, and deal teams…and under-focuses on the broader groups who learn outcomes early (e.g., product development, IT, comms, HR, strategy, program management, agency partners).
Update training so it matches the channel employee use
Talk to your employees about this, and examine how you train on insider trading today. Avoid lectures on materiality and focus instead on scenario-based reality:
- What counts as confidential information in plain language
- Why betting is still misuse even if no stock trade occurs
- What the consequences are for violating an inside-information code or policy
Re-check access: who gets what, when, and why
Review who has access to what, and whether controls prevent information from going where it doesn’t belong and/or creates excessive risk.
Consider pressure-testing:
- Who can see timelines and decision memos
- How far draft communications travel
- Whether third parties are included early by default
- Whether you have a clean “need-to-know” rationale you can defend
Decide your stance on anonymity and reporting—before you need it
The ability to “bet anonymously” is part of what makes this risk operationally difficult to prevent and detect. To effectively manage your insider information risk, consider the following these keystone questions and develop your risk management protocols accordingly:
- What behaviors do you explicitly prohibit as misuse of company information?
- What reporting channels exist for concerns?
- Who owns the response when rumors point to internal misuse?
Explore Further
If you want the full context and discussion, listen to Ethicast Reacts: “Insider Trading and the Maduro Raid.” And if you’re benchmarking how peer companies are handling these new integrity risks, the Business Ethics Leadership Alliance (BELA) is built for exactly that kind of practitioner-to-practitioner problem solving.
Bill Coffin | Editor-in-Chief, Ethisphere Magazine, Ethisphere
Bill Coffin is the Editor-in-Chief of Ethisphere Magazine and supports the larger content strategy of Ethisphere. He is an internationally recognized writer and editorial leader in the fields of ethics, compliance, insurance and risk management. His work has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Forbes and Fortune, as well as Compliance Week, National Underwriter, Risk Management, Best’s Review and other B2B media. Previously, Bill served as Director, Senior Editor at AIG, leading content strategy for one of the world’s largest insurance companies.