On January 3, 2026, US forces raided Caracas and extracted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife. Shortly before the raid, US soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke used classified information to bet that the former Venezuelan president would be ousted from his position. He wagered around 33,000 dollars on the prediction market Polymarket. He won 409,000 dollars as a result.
On X (formerly known as Twitter), Polymarket claimed, “Today's arrest is proof the system works.” This is far from the truth. If Venezuelan authorities picked up on Van Dyke’s suspicious bet, the wager would have put the US military operation into serious jeopardy. This issue is not limited to this event alone. Plans for future military operations and other government actions could be prematurely revealed to other nations through insider trading. Prediction markets, which allow individuals to place bets on almost anything imaginable—geopolitical events, culture, economy—present a tantalizing opportunity for governmental officials who want easy money.
However, insider trading is just one of many issues regarding prediction markets. When these markets reward people for predicting if a certain person dies, perversion has the potential to become a money-making—and murderous—tool.
Prediction markets also allow outside actors to influence politics. By placing large bets, one person could actively shift the odds that a certain geopolitical event—such as a candidate winning an election—will occur. Data from prediction markets is used in many influential news sources, such as Cable News Network (CNN) and Fox News. These artificial odds are now presented as real, which in turn affect people to make decisions based on manipulated information. This enables for foreign actors to shape the political landscape within the US as well as other countries.
Sites such as Polymarket and Kalshi are engineered to keep users engaged. Features such as leaderboards and constant notifications foster addiction. In an article written in Science, authors Nizan Geslevich Packin and Sharon Rabinovitz argue, “Participants perceive themselves as analysts or engaged citizens rather than gamblers, a distortion hindering help-seeking even as financial and psychological damage accumulates.” Not only are users addicted, but they are not able to realize that their behavior is hurting them. Compounding this situation is the lack of regulations in prediction markets usually found on regular gambling platforms, allowing users to spend more money and proceed with less identity verifications.
Concord Academy students should realize that placing a Polymarket or Kalshi bet means supporting a company that promotes insider trading and perversion, and allows foreign actors to influence national politics. Furthermore, these prediction markets are highly addictive—even placing one bet may eventually lead to a financially and emotionally harmful habit.