After earning more than $400,000 with classified information by betting online on the fall of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, US Army Special Forces Sergeant Major Gannon Ken Van Dyke was charged with five crimes, including fraud and theft of information, for which he could face up to 50 years in prison, the Department of Justice reported.

First modification: 04/24/2026 - 16:03 Last modification: 04/24/2026 - 21:08

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Before the historic fall of Chavista leader Nicolás Maduro, in the early hours of January 3, 2026, few people in the world could bet that the president of Venezuela would be captured in Caracas by US troops.

"He had access to sensitive, confidential and classified information about the operation"

One of them, Gannon soldier Ken Van Dyke, did not resist the idea of ​​​​monetizing this confidential information. Nearly four months later, he has been charged with several crimes, including fraud, the Justice Department said in an April 23 statement.

The 38-year-old soldier "participated in the planning and execution" of the operation to capture Maduro, so "he had access to sensitive, confidential and classified information about the operation," indicated the Donald Trump Administration.

Since the beginning of December, the soldier allegedly deposited some $33,000 in 13 bets related to the US intervention in Caracas, despite having signed confidentiality agreements in which he promised not to disclose "any classified or sensitive information" related to the operations.

After Operation Absolute Resolve, the soldier obtained "earnings of approximately $409,881", according to US Government estimates.

Consequently, he will be prosecuted for unlawful use of confidential government information for personal gain, theft of non-public government information, commodity fraud, wire fraud, and unlawful monetary transaction. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of 50 years in prison.

Polymarket said in a statement that it had reported the user who placed the bets to the Department of Justice and had cooperated with its investigation. "The use of privileged information has no place in Polymarket," the platform claimed in the letter. "Today's arrest shows that the system works," he added.

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Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche highlighted that US soldiers "receive classified information in order to carry out their mission (...) and are prohibited from using it for personal financial gain."

Van Dyke's career in the Army began in 2008. As early as 2023, he was promoted to the rank of master sergeant, the second-highest rank for non-commissioned officers in the Army, according to the indictment. Federal prosecutors indicated that he was part of the special forces and was stationed at Fort Bragg, near Fayetteville, North Carolina.

The indictment states that Van Dyke was photographed after the operation in Caracas on the deck of a ship, "dressed in a US military uniform and carrying a rifle, standing with three other people who were also wearing US military uniforms."

Read alsoEscorted and handcuffed, Nicolás Maduro arrives in New York after being captured by the US.

Double complaint

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), the federal agency that regulates prediction markets, announced Thursday that it had filed a parallel complaint against Van Dyke.

The indictment reveals that Van Dyke transferred $35,000 from his personal bank account to a cryptocurrency exchange account on December 26, days before a series of bets at Polymarket. The vast majority of the plays were made on the night of January 2, just hours before the first missiles fell on Caracas.

In addition, the sergeant won another $5,000 in three other contests related to Venezuela, according to the document.

Michael Selig, president of the CFTC, accused the military officer of "endangering the national security of the United States and risking the lives of American military personnel."

Shortly after getting rich at Polymarket, Van Dyke deposited most of the money in an offshore cryptocurrency vault and then into a new brokerage account. He also asked the platform to delete his account, claiming he had lost access to the email associated with it, according to federal prosecutors.

Read alsoSuspicious movements in the energy market and bets based on the war in Iran

Conflicts of interest

The case of soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke does not represent an isolated event. In one of the most recent developments, in early April, AP reported that a group of new Polymarket users placed very specific and well-timed bets on whether the United States and Iran would reach a ceasefire on April 7, as they did, generating hundreds of thousands of dollars in profits for these new customers.

That same day, the White House warned its staff about the illegitimate use of private information to operate in prediction markets, as leaked by the AP.

The war against Iran has become one of the most effervescent topics in the prediction markets. In early 2026, six Polymarket accounts won $1.2 million after betting that the United States would attack Iran on February 28, the day the war in the Middle East began.

There are no arrests related to those bets and, so far, there is no evidence linking President Donald Trump or White House officials to such transactions.

Read alsoBetting on catastrophe: the dizzying rise of prediction markets

On Wednesday, Kalshi, the other giant of the prediction market, fined and suspended three congressional candidates accused by the company itself of betting on the outcome of their own elections.

"Unfortunately, the whole world has become a kind of casino (...) in Europe and everywhere they are doing these gambling things," Trump said before adding to the press that he was never "very much in favor of that."

However, Democratic congressmen have accused the Republican and his family of having conflicts of interest. "The Trump family has made $4 billion from the presidency," Sen. Bernie Sanders wrote in a post on X on Thursday.

In March, Trump reported on his Truth Social platform about "very productive" talks with Iran, causing oil prices to plummet and stocks to soar. Those who anticipated this situation probably received benefits worth tens of millions of dollars, according to calculations by a market operator cited by AFP.

Members of the Trump family have made hundreds of millions of dollars in profits from cryptocurrencies, a market he has sought to deregulate.

Additionally, the president's son, Donald Jr. Trump, is a partner at 1789 Capital, which made a multimillion-dollar investment in Polymarket last year, prompting the prediction market to name him an advisor to the company.

Read alsoThe war in the betting market: is there a leak of insider information?

With AFP and AP

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