‘Who was it?’: US senator raises red flag on massive $1.5B trade timed 5 mins before Trump's Iran announcement — how to get rich even from the outside

“$1.5 BILLION. Let me say it again — a $1.5 BILLION BET,” Murphy wrote on X. “Who was it? Trump? A family member? A White House staffer? This is corruption.”

The market reaction was immediate. Oil prices dropped sharply following the announcement, while stock futures surged, making those well-timed positions highly profitable.

Data review by The Wall Street Journal shows a burst of trading activity hitting oil futures in a narrow window just before the news became public, and more than once (2). For example, on Feb. 28, a blockchain analytics firm, Bubblemaps, identified “suspected insiders” who made $1.2 million by wagering on a U.S. strike on Polymarket.

There was no clear public catalyst for those bets, either.

For everyday investors, the episode raises a question: Is the market a level playing field? And for that matter, has it ever been?

Why these trades are raising red flags

The concern has little to do with the size of the trades and more to do with the timing.

Large positions appearing seconds or minutes before market-moving geopolitical announcements are rare, to say the least, and analysts say this pattern stands out.

“This appears abnormal, for sure,” Mukesh Sahdev, chief oil analyst at XAnalysts, said to the BBC (3). “There were no indications that any serious talks had been taking place between the US and Iran. So to place so much money on oil going down raises questions.”

Others echoed that concern. Rachel Winter, a partner at Killik & Co., told the BBC that the sequence of events has fueled speculation that traders may have acted on information that wasn’t yet public.

None of this proves wrongdoing. However, the clustering of massive trades ahead of major announcements is enough to trigger scrutiny, if not investigations into insider trading.

What is insider trading?

In simple terms, insider trading is the buying and selling of securities based on material nonpublic information. This information is important enough to move markets, but has not yet been released to the public.

Not all insider trading is illegal. Corporate executives, for example, can legally buy or sell shares of their own companies as long as they disclose those trades and aren’t acting on confidential information.

But when someone trades on information that hasn’t yet been made public, like a pending policy or war decision, it could cross into illegal territory.

Penalties can be severe, including civil fines of up to three times the profits gained. Criminal charges can carry a federal prison sentence of up to 20 years and a $5M fine (4).

Retail investors can’t play this game

Even when trades like this look obvious in hindsight, they’re nearly impossible to replicate. To profit from a move like this, an investor would need to know a few things:

• Exactly when the announcement is coming
• How the market will react
• How large the move will be

Naturally, most investors have no access to that information.

By the time a headline hits your screen, the market has already moved. Sometimes the opportunity to profit lasts only seconds.

As such, investors aren’t just competing against other traders in this case. They’re competing against information asymmetry.

Let’s put that trade into perspective

First, consider how long it would take a typical investor to build that kind of position necessary for a trade of this scale.

If you invested $1,500 a month, which is an incredible amount to invest for most Americans on its own, that would only add up to $18,000 a year. At that rate, you’d be well on your way to reaching $1.5 billion in more than 83,000 years and assuming no investment gains, of course.

But what if you did win big?

Assume you earned a remarkable 8% annual return on those $18,000 yearly investments — every year. You would still need 75 years to reach $1.5 billion. That’s longer than most people’s entire investing lifetime.

But if you invested from birth to death, the average American man might be able to enjoy that kind of wealth for a year and change, based on the CDC’s posted 76.5-year life expectancy for men in the U.S. (5).

That isn’t to say that you can’t get rich with the market, however.

You can still take some calculated risks

That doesn’t mean investors will stop trying to navigate short-term market moves. Timing the market, albeit a gamble, can come with great profits if you’re lucky. If you want to invest aggressively, you have options.

Platforms like Robinhood are designed to make investing simpler and more approachable.

If you prefer a more hands-on approach, you can also buy and sell individual stocks, fractional shares and options (for qualified traders) — backed by 24/7 support. Stocks, ETFs and their options trades are commission-free.

With access to popular ETFs like the Vanguard S&P 500, you can build diversified exposure without needing to pick individual stocks.

The platform also offers both a traditional IRA and a Roth IRA, so you can choose the tax strategy that fits your retirement plan.

With its recurring investment feature, you can set up automatic investments of your preferred fractional shares, stocks and ETFs on your own schedule.

Over time, this helps make investing a habit and steadily grows your portfolio.

Get data-driven stock recommendations

For investors looking to make more informed decisions, research tools can help cut through the noise.

Moby offers expert research and recommendations to help you identify strong, long-term investments backed by advice from former hedge fund analysts.

In four years, and across almost 400 stock picks, their recommendations have beaten the S&P 500 by almost 12% on average. They also offer a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Moby’s team spends hundreds of hours sifting through financial news and data to provide you with stock and crypto reports delivered straight to you. Their research keeps you up-to-the-minute on market shifts and can help you reduce the guesswork behind choosing stocks and ETFs.

Plus, their reports are easy to understand for beginners, so that you can become a smarter investor in just five minutes — no complex financial jargon here.

But even the best research has limits. When markets move on information that isn’t public, no amount of analysis can fully level the playing field.

Can investors still trust the market?

Senator Murphy is only one of many voices calling for closer scrutiny of market activity around major policy announcements. After all, it’s not just politicians who can influence markets and reap the benefits of insider information.

These concerns come at a time when more everyday investors than ever are participating in the market, often through low-cost trading apps and retirement accounts. Many Americans simply do not have the same informational edge as institutional players.

If confidence in the market's fairness erodes, those consequences could extend beyond a single trade. Markets, after all, rely on the trust between investors of all levels and publicly traded companies that provide products or services (6).

Invest without trying to time the market

Instead of trying to predict events, something even professional investors get wrong, the average investor takes a different approach: Consistency.

Trying to jump in and out of markets based on breaking news is risky, especially when prices move before headlines even reach public eyes.