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Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

theguardian.com

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Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#41

Post by Karrot_Kream »

tencentshill wrote: post #28
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #20

Couldn't insiders just trade Brent Crude futures and do the same thing? There's more than enough liquidity in Brent that an insider can make great money.

A market with regulations, vs. no regulations.

Right so how are you going to find it and who is going to prosecute the insider trading here?

My point isn't that an unregulated prediction market (Polymarket non-US markets are non-CFTC certified) can obscure insider trading. My point is that Brent has enough liquidity that an insider can trade without moving markets. There's plenty of insiders that work on a contract basis and aren't required to disclose trades by STOCK Act provisions for public disclosure.

And honestly we aren't even out of the 45 day window around disclosures that would surface any Brent or WTI trades around the current Iran conflict anyway.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#42

Post by fakedang »

TitaRusell wrote: post #24
tmnvix wrote: post #15

> “For the purposes of this market, an ‘official ceasefire agreement’ requires clear public confirmation from both the United States government and the government of Iran that they have agreed to halt military hostilities against one another.” (by March 31) Seems a rather risky bet considering how deep Israel has ventured into its war in Lebanon. Very doubtful they will stop anytime soon. Given the leverage Israel ha…

There was an interesting article in a local paper here about non zionist Jews emigrating from Israel. There are no missiles and draft in Western Europe and the shops are open on every holy day. Unfortunately this leaves the holy land to the fanatics.

Non-zionist Jews have been leaving Israel whenever the opportunity rose. This war was just an accelerant for further emigration.

The only ones who choose to stay back are folks fresh into Aliyah, who might've received a lot of incentives from the government to settle in the illegal West Bank settlements. Or those who really believe in Zionism. The former are typically guys who couldn't make the cut even in their home countries, so they're certainly not adequate replacements for the ones leaving.

Not to mention, it's mostly the liberal cities like Tel Aviv which have faced the brunt of Iranian barrages. Jerusalem has been barely hit. Folks staying in those cities, working actual jobs contributing to the economy and not Torah studies, are likely the ones leaving - I know many of my acquaintances who've left Tel Aviv for the US or Dubai.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#43

Post by idle_zealot »

huijzer wrote: post #38
delecti wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the main reason is that they were all too incompetent to realize what the effects of the war would be on the global financial system. The bets were probably just a happy opportunity for corruption. > The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt Look on the bright side, at least the malicious actors aren't able to competently implement their goals.

When do we cross the barrier from incompetent to nefarious?

It's not an either-or question; they're very transparently both nefarious and incompetent.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#44

Post by delecti »

huijzer wrote: post #38
delecti wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the main reason is that they were all too incompetent to realize what the effects of the war would be on the global financial system. The bets were probably just a happy opportunity for corruption. > The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt Look on the bright side, at least the malicious actors aren't able to competently implement their goals.

When do we cross the barrier from incompetent to nefarious?

They're orthogonal, so there's no barrier. They're all nefarious, and most are also incompetent.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#45

Post by jmyeet »

mikkupikku wrote: post #17

If the administration decides to end this stupid war just so they can cash out some profitable bets... I don't even know what I would think. The whole thing is so stupid it makes my head hurt.

It's not really up to the US and Israel when this war of choice ends anymore. It's up to Iran. And Iran, justifiably, is going to demand their pound of flesh. That could require some combination of ending the (criminal) sanctions, de-militarizing the Gulf and reining in Israel.

The problem is all of these things are politically untenable. This is the only reason why I think this war could continue long term because Trump simply cannot back down.

I think the recession from this could actually get so bad that there's now a nonzero (but still small) chance Trump gets removed from office, either by impeachment or by being 25A'ed.

It is hard to adequately state what a geopolitical disaster this was and it is I think quite easily the biggest mistake by an administration in the entire history of the US. I'm not exaggerating.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#46

Post by genxy »

TitaRusell wrote: post #24
tmnvix wrote: post #15

> “For the purposes of this market, an ‘official ceasefire agreement’ requires clear public confirmation from both the United States government and the government of Iran that they have agreed to halt military hostilities against one another.” (by March 31) Seems a rather risky bet considering how deep Israel has ventured into its war in Lebanon. Very doubtful they will stop anytime soon. Given the leverage Israel ha…

There was an interesting article in a local paper here about non zionist Jews emigrating from Israel. There are no missiles and draft in Western Europe and the shops are open on every holy day. Unfortunately this leaves the holy land to the fanatics.

Zion for Zionists is always what they have wanted. Originally, it was supposed to be Ashkenazi Jews only.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#47

Post by fakedang »

ck2 wrote: post #40

There's no ceasefire, Iran has no idea what he is making up as always. He's delaying until the Marines get there in a few days. And until the markets close on Friday, notice how he said 5 days on Monday. He's also bombed them the past two times in the middle of negotiations, why stop now The man is a proven constant pathological liar since the day he came down the golden escalator 10 years ago, literally every time h…

Iran already knows his bluff. Abbas Aragchi even explicitly mentioned this in an interview, stating that negotiating with the US is a pointless exercise, but it tells the Iranians whether Dump is planning a major strike. So there's definitely going to be a major strike happening by Friday or Saturday.

To end the war, Iran will demand a full withdrawal of US forces from all neighboring countries as well as a shut down of US bases. This will also have the added benefit of giving them full control of the strait when the US leaves, and a free hand to bombard Israel. The GCC are already fatigued from a war they had no say in, so if the Iranians strike the desal plants, they will either join the US offensive or they'll kick the American troops out.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#48

Post by ajcp »

boramalper wrote: post #27

> The wallets “definitely [look like] someone with some degree of inside info”, said Ben Yorke, formerly a researcher with CoinTelegraph, now building an AI trading platform called Starchild. Ben Yorke is the only expert I see mentioned in the article, so it'd be a lot more accurate (and a lot less sensational) if The Guardian changed its title to "... says one expert" (but it wouldn't sound as interesting then, woul…

> $800k doesn't sound like that much of money for someone that has access to that kind of insider knowledge

I think you over-estimate by a large margin how much congressional staffers and/or Pentagon employees make, many of whom could have access to this kind of information in the course of their duties.

Re: Bets on US-Iran ceasefire show signs of insider knowledge, say experts

#50

Post by dylan604 »

As soon as the news hit that the Iranians are claiming they have not negotiated anything while Trump is claiming the supposed negotiations are why he's not bombing Iranian power infrastructure really made wonder who Trump is trying to fool. It reminds me of Musk's tweet about securing financing to go private. Comments like this are meant to move a needle.
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