Trump’s Teleprompter Operator Investigated for Insider Trading, "Whistleblower" Turns Out to Be Prediction Platform Kalshi
According to reports from CNBC and ABC, a longtime teleprompter operator for President Trump, Gabriel Perez, is under federal investigation for allegedly using insider information to place bets on the prediction market platform Kalshi. Perez, who had handled Trump's speeches since 2016, is suspected of trading on over a dozen upcoming presidential addresses, including the State of the Union, based on his advance knowledge of speech content. Kalshi's monitoring systems flagged the atypical trading patterns in March, leading to his account being frozen and the case being referred to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Perez reportedly profited over $90,000, though most funds are held by the platform. He is now in settlement talks with the CFTC and has been placed on unpaid leave by the White House.
This incident is part of a broader pattern of insider trading on prediction markets. Similar cases involve a congressional candidate betting against his own attendance, military personnel using classified information, and a Google engineer trading on internal data. The growing liquidity of these markets, with some contracts seeing over $150,000 in volume, creates incentives for abuse. In response, platforms like Kalshi are enhancing monitoring, requiring occupational disclosures, and cooperating with regulators. The CFTC and the Justice Department are pursuing civil and criminal actions, while the White House has issued memos explicitly barring staff from such trading.
Foresight News07/17 10:01