Google employee charged with $1M Polymarket insider trading bet on search term
Google employee charged with $1M Polymarket insider trading bet on search term
谷歌员工因利用搜索关键词内幕交易在 Polymarket 获利 100 万美元被起诉
Federal prosecutors charged a Google employee with fraud on Wednesday, alleging that he made $1.2 million from bets on Polymarket that used insider information. 联邦检察官周三对一名谷歌员工提起欺诈指控，称其利用内幕信息在 Polymarket 平台上进行投注，非法获利 120 万美元。
The employee, Michele Spagnuolo, has been charged with money laundering, commodities fraud and wire fraud, according to the complaint filed in the Southern District of New York. 根据提交至纽约南区联邦法院的起诉书，该员工名为 Michele Spagnuolo，被控洗钱、商品欺诈和电信欺诈。
Google said it’s working with law enforcement and that Spagnuolo has been placed on leave. 谷歌表示正在配合执法部门调查，且 Spagnuolo 已被停职。
Prosecutors claim that Michele Spagnuolo, a staff information security engineer at Google, used confidential information to place trades correctly betting that singer d4vd would be Google’s most searched person in 2025. 检察官称，身为谷歌员工信息安全工程师的 Michele Spagnuolo 利用机密信息进行交易，准确押注歌手 d4vd 将成为 2025 年谷歌搜索量最高的人物。
Spagnuolo has been charged with money laundering, commodities fraud and wire fraud. The complaint, filed in the Southern District of New York, was unsealed on Wednesday. ABC News first reported on the complaint. Spagnuolo was arrested Wednesday morning in New York, ABC reported. Spagnuolo 被控洗钱、商品欺诈和电信欺诈。这份提交至纽约南区联邦法院的起诉书于周三解封。美国广播公司（ABC News）率先报道了此案。据 ABC 报道，Spagnuolo 已于周三上午在纽约被捕。
“Spagnuolo had access to Google’s internal data systems, including a particular Google internal software tool that provided him access to confidential, nonpublic Year in Search data,” the prosecutors said in their complaint. 检察官在起诉书中指出：“Spagnuolo 有权访问谷歌的内部数据系统，包括一个特定的谷歌内部软件工具，该工具使他能够获取机密的、非公开的‘年度搜索’数据。”
Some observers of the Polymarket platform flagged the user “AlphaRaccoon” back in December for suspicious trades on the most searched person contracts. The complaint Wednesday said that Spagnuolo was the person behind that account. 早在去年 12 月，Polymarket 平台的一些观察人士就曾标记用户“AlphaRaccoon”，称其在“年度搜索人物”合约上的交易存在可疑之处。周三的起诉书证实，Spagnuolo 正是该账户背后的操作者。
“Google officially and publicly announced its Year in Search 2025 results on or about December 4, 2025. Soon after it did so, Spagnuolo’s AlphaRaccoon account, profited approximately $1.2 million on his Google Year in Search 2025-related bets,” the complaint said. 起诉书称：“谷歌于 2025 年 12 月 4 日左右正式公开宣布了其 2025 年度搜索结果。在此之后不久，Spagnuolo 的 AlphaRaccoon 账户通过其与谷歌 2025 年度搜索相关的投注，获利约 120 万美元。”
Spagnuolo appeared before a federal magistrate judge Wednesday. He did not enter a plea and was released on a $2.25 million bond, ABC reported. 据 ABC 报道，Spagnuolo 周三在联邦治安法官面前出庭。他未进行抗辩，并以 225 万美元的保释金获释。
“We’re working with law enforcement on their investigation,” Google said in a statement. “The employee accessed our marketing material using a tool available to all employees, but using such confidential information to place bets is a serious breach of our policies.” “We’ve placed the employee on leave and will take the appropriate action,” the company added. 谷歌在一份声明中表示：“我们正在配合执法部门的调查。该员工是利用所有员工均可使用的工具访问了我们的营销材料，但利用此类机密信息进行投注严重违反了我们的政策。”该公司补充道：“我们已将该员工停职，并将采取适当的后续行动。”
“Polymarket worked closely with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and the CFTC, and is the only prediction platform to date whose cooperation has led to insider trading charges in the United States,” a Polymarket spokesperson said in a statement. “We are committed to maintaining accurate, fair, and transparent markets as well as enforcing our rules and working with our regulators and law enforcement.” Polymarket 发言人在声明中表示：“Polymarket 与美国纽约南区联邦检察官办公室及美国商品期货交易委员会（CFTC）密切合作，是迄今为止唯一一家因配合调查而促成美国内幕交易指控的预测平台。我们致力于维护准确、公平和透明的市场，并执行我们的规则，与监管机构和执法部门合作。”
Spagnuolo is also facing a civil case from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, where he’s charged with insider trading. The complaint detailed that Spagnuolo correctly predicted the outcomes of a slew of other search markets, including contracts like “Will Zohran Mamdani rank in the Top 5 most searched” and “Will Squid Game be the #1 searched TV show.” Spagnuolo 还面临美国商品期货交易委员会（CFTC）提起的民事诉讼，被控内幕交易。起诉书详细说明，Spagnuolo 还准确预测了其他一系列搜索市场的结果，包括“Zohran Mamdani 是否会进入搜索量前五名”以及“《鱿鱼游戏》是否会成为搜索量第一的电视剧”等合约。
“Spagnuolo misappropriated the material Confidential Information by knowingly or recklessly using it to trade the 2025 Year in Search List Contracts in breach of his duties of trust and confidentiality,” the CFTC complaint alleged. CFTC 的起诉书称：“Spagnuolo 违反了其信任和保密义务，明知或鲁莽地利用重要的机密信息进行 2025 年度搜索列表合约的交易，从而挪用了这些机密信息。”
The federal complaint marks the second high-profile insider trading case on Polymarket in just over a month. In April, then-active U.S. Army Special Forces master sergeant Gannon Ken Van Dyke was arrested over charges that he used classified information to bet on contracts related to the U.S. operation to capture Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro. Prosecutors said Van Dyke made more than $400,000 off his trades. 这份联邦起诉书标志着 Polymarket 在短短一个多月内发生的第二起高调内幕交易案件。今年 4 月，时任美国陆军特种部队军士长 Gannon Ken Van Dyke 因被控利用机密信息对有关美国抓捕委内瑞拉总统尼古拉斯·马杜罗的行动合约进行投注而被捕。检察官称，Van Dyke 通过这些交易获利超过 40 万美元。