Federal authorities arrested U.S. Army Master Sergeant Gannon Ken Van Dyke on Thursday, charging the 38-year-old special forces soldier with a series of federal crimes related to insider trading on the prediction market Polymarket. Prosecutors allege that Van Dyke, who was stationed at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, leveraged classified information regarding 'Operation Absolute Resolve'—the mission to detain former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro—to place 13 successful wagers between December 26, 2025, and January 2, 2026.
According to the Department of Justice, Van Dyke invested $33,034 of his own funds into contracts predicting whether U.S. forces would land in Venezuela, invade the country, or remove Maduro from power. Following the successful capture of Maduro and his wife at a Caracas residence during the predawn hours of January 3, 2026, those bets yielded a total profit of $409,881. The indictment, unsealed in federal court, charges Van Dyke with five counts, including commodities fraud, wire fraud, theft of nonpublic government information, and the unlawful use of classified intelligence.
U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton emphasized that decentralized platforms do not grant immunity from federal law. 'The defendant allegedly violated the trust placed in him by the United States Government by using classified information about a sensitive military operation to place bets on the timing and outcome of that very operation, all to turn a profit,' Clayton said in a statement. 'That is clear insider trading and is illegal under federal law.'
Investigators noted that Van Dyke’s actions went beyond simple illicit trading. According to court filings, the soldier attempted to obscure his activity three days after the mission was publicly announced. He reportedly contacted Polymarket to request the deletion of his account, falsely claiming he had lost access to his registered email address. This attempt to scrub his digital footprint failed to prevent a monthslong investigation by both the DOJ and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
In conjunction with the criminal charges, the CFTC is pursuing a parallel insider trading complaint in federal court. The agency noted that the case serves as a warning that prediction markets are not a haven for using misappropriated confidential information for personal gain. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission stated that by using classified information about U.S. operations for personal profit, the defendant took actions that endangered U.S. national security and placed the lives of American service members in harm’s way.
