Jun 6, 2026
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A Reddit user claims to have uncovered evidence of suspicious trading patterns on prediction market platform Polymarket after analyzing more than 1.3 billion trades and 2.7 million wallets — findings that are now drawing calls for further scrutiny from traders, regulators and market observers.
The researcher, posting in Reddit’s r/ClaudeAI community, said he connected an AI tool to a database containing every Polymarket wallet and trade, allowing him to query the platform’s entire trading history using plain-English prompts.
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What he found has fueled a growing online debate over whether some traders may be operating with an information advantage.
Among the findings:
- Roughly 80% of wallets were unprofitable
- Only 2.4% wallets generated more than US$1,000 in profit
- The top 0.1% of wallets captured 71.5% of the platform’s roughly US$1 billion in total profits
More notably, the researcher identified what he described as “weird and suspicious trading patterns that look like insiders.”
The wallets that don’t look like ordinary traders
In follow-up comments, researcher and Reddit user Advanced-Rub2065 highlighted wallets with unusually high win rates, concentrated betting activity immediately before event outcomes and clusters of accounts apparently funded from common sources.
Digging deeper into the data, researcher and Reddit user Advanced-Rub2065 identified a small group of wallets that appeared to consistently beat the odds. Some repeatedly placed large bets shortly before events were decided, while others appeared connected through common funding sources. One wallet reportedly earned US$9.37 million across nearly 4,700 completed bets while maintaining a success rate far above what many observers would expect from luck alone.
The researcher argues these patterns deserve closer scrutiny.
“The patterns that flag a wallet: betting hard against the consensus right before an event resolves, unusually high win rate on one narrow category, clustering with other wallets funded by the same source, and concentrated timing,” the researcher wrote.
The analysis also identified several wallets that lost millions of dollars in only a handful of trades. One wallet reportedly lost US$21.8 million across just eight bets, while another lost US$18.9 million in 22 bets. The researcher argued these patterns appear inconsistent with ordinary trading losses and could potentially indicate wash trading or transfers of wealth between participants.
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To be clear, neither regulators nor law enforcement agencies have verified the findings, and unusual trading success or failure, on its own, is not evidence of insider trading, money laundering or other illegal conduct.
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Suspicion isn’t proof
Nic Skitt, COO of Wise Publishing, cautioned that blockchain analysis can identify suspicious patterns but cannot determine who is behind a wallet or why trades occurred.
“A wallet that wins big right before news breaks looks suspicious, but looking suspicious isn’t proof,” Skitt said in a statement to Money.ca. “The danger here is calling out actual fraud, although I do admit there’s reason for suspicion.”
He added that regulators have powers unavailable to independent researchers.
“A regulator could potentially tie a wallet to a real person. They can subpoena the exchange for the name, ID and bank account behind it,” Skitt said. “This kind of analysis is a great way to find where to look. The analysis offers a starting point for an investigation.”
What the regulators are saying
When asked, the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) stopped short of commenting on the Reddit analysis itself, but in a statement to Money.ca said prediction markets, such as Polymarket, can fall under Canadian securities and derivatives laws.
“Prediction markets, like Polymarket, may involve products that are considered securities, derivatives or both under Canadian securities and derivatives law,” CSA spokesperson Ilana Kelemen explained.
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Kelemen also noted that securities regulators actively pursue market misconduct when evidence exists.
“Securities regulators take enforcement actions where they have identified violations of securities laws, including insider trading or conduct in the capital markets that is contrary to the public interest,” she said.
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Regulators are already concerned about prediction markets
The timing is notable because Canadian regulators have already raised concerns about prediction markets.
In April, the CSA and the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization (CIRO) reminded investors that anyone trading or facilitating event contracts that qualify as securities or derivatives must comply with Canadian securities laws. Regulators warned that failure to comply with those requirements could lead to enforcement action.
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The CSA also noted that while two CIRO-regulated dealers have been authorized to facilitate access to certain event contracts under strict conditions, “to date, no prediction market has been recognized as an exchange or registered as a dealer (or exempted from those requirements) by the CSA.”
The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) previously sanctioned Polymarket’s operators for violating Ontario’s ban on short-term binary options. In April 2025, the OSC approved a settlement after determining Polymarket’s former and current operators offered prohibited binary options to Ontario investors between 2020 and 2023. The settlement included market bans and financial penalties.
Who can investigate?
For now, the Reddit analysis proves only that unusual patterns exist within publicly available blockchain data.
It also demonstrates a critical market change: The barriers to investigating financial markets have fallen dramatically.
“What changes is who can look,” Skitt said. In the past, investigations and analyses had to be undertaken by regulators or well-funded newsrooms. “Now, almost anyone with the skills can surface suspicious patterns.”
Whether those patterns ultimately point to sophisticated traders, coordinated betting networks, insider information — or something more serious — remains an open question.
For the individual investor, Keleman offers the following insight: “Avoid using platforms that do not comply with Canadian securities laws, and are not registered with or recognized by a Canadian securities regulator, as they present significant risks to customers because investors’ assets may not be adequately safeguarded.”
To be sure, investors are encouraged to check the registration of any person or company offering investment products.
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Romana King, Senior Editor at Money.ca, also writes for various North American publications and the RKHomeowner blog. Her book, House Poor No More, is an Amazon bestseller and five-time award winner, including the 2022 New York CPA Society's Excellence in Financial Journalism (EFJ) Book Award.
