A former White House teleprompter operator has agreed to pay $172,539 after U.S. regulators found he used advance access to President Donald Trump’s speeches to make more than $107,500 trading prediction market contracts.
Summary
- Gabriel Perez made more than $107,500 trading prediction market contracts using advance access to Trump’s speeches, the CFTC said.
- Perez must return $107,539 in profits, pay a $65,000 penalty and serve a three year trading ban.
- The CFTC said Perez received a reduced penalty because of his cooperation and credited Kalshi for assisting the investigation.
- The case follows other insider trading investigations involving prediction markets, including trades linked to Polymarket and Kalshi.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission said on Aug. 28 that Gabriel Perez misappropriated material, nonpublic information obtained through his federal government job to trade event contracts for his personal benefit. The settlement requires Perez to return $107,539.02 in profits and pay a $65,000 civil monetary penalty.
Perez has agreed to a three-year trading ban and must cease further violations of the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC regulations. The $65,000 penalty was substantially reduced under the agency’s new cooperation policy because of what the regulator described as his “exemplary cooperation” during the investigation.
White House access gave Perez advance knowledge of Trump speeches
Between December 2025 and February 2026, Perez worked as a White House teleprompter operator while trading presidential “mention market” contracts, according to the CFTC.
Such contracts are event contracts whose outcomes depend on whether particular words or phrases are used during a presidential speech. Perez’s position gave him access to speeches before Trump delivered them publicly, allowing him to know information directly connected to the contracts he was trading.
The regulator found that Perez used the information in breach of his duty of trust and confidence, generating more than $107,500 in trading profits during the period.
The CFTC credited KalshiEX with assisting its investigation. Perez is no longer employed by the federal government after previously being placed on unpaid leave following scrutiny of his trading activity.
The enforcement action comes as regulators and prediction market operators have been dealing with multiple cases involving traders accused of using information unavailable to the public.
Prediction market insider trading cases have drawn CFTC action
Another federal case centers on U.S. Army Master Sergeant Gannon Ken Van Dyke, who has been accused of using classified military information to trade contracts on Polymarket connected to the operation targeting Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.
As crypto.news previously reported, prosecutors allege Van Dyke made about $409,881 through 13 Venezuela-related trades after putting more than $33,000 into the positions. He pleaded not guilty and has disputed whether the contracts involved legally qualify as swaps.
A federal judge in August stayed the CFTC’s civil enforcement action against Van Dyke until the related criminal proceedings are completed. The case has placed the legal treatment of event contracts and the use of confidential government information in prediction market trading before a federal court.
Kalshi has faced a separate insider-trading episode involving an editor affiliated with YouTube creator MrBeast. In February, the platform imposed a $20,397.58 penalty and a two-year suspension after finding that the editor traded contracts connected to MrBeast content using confidential information.
The MrBeast editor case involved violations of Kalshi’s prohibited insider-trading rules and a failure to cooperate with the investigation. Beast Industries subsequently opened its own investigation and said it had zero tolerance for the misuse of proprietary information.
Scrutiny has since extended to accounts whose trading patterns raise concerns before regulators determine whether a violation occurred. Polymarket referred nearly 100 wallets for further review after an analysis identified trading activity carrying characteristics associated with potentially informed positions.
The review covered signals including newly created wallets, concentrated positions and trades entered shortly before major events. A suspicious designation does not establish that insider trading occurred, and a referral does not mean charges will follow.
Kalshi has expanded controls around prediction markets
Kalshi has introduced several controls intended to identify traders who may have access to confidential information.
In June, the exchange began requiring users in certain higher-risk markets to disclose their employers, giving its compliance team more information to compare a trader’s employment with the subject of a contract. The policy followed a series of cases involving people whose professional positions could give them access to information relevant to market outcomes.
The platform later integrated with StarCompliance, a system used by financial firms to monitor employee trading. Kalshi said the arrangement would allow participating companies to supervise employees’ prediction market activity through compliance systems already used for other financial transactions.
Its trade surveillance controls include a whistleblower reporting channel and a risk-scoring process applied to proposed markets before they are listed. Kalshi has used its own detection engine alongside outside surveillance and integrity services to examine potentially problematic trading behavior.
Regulatory attention has extended past insider trading. The CFTC in August reminded regulated entities offering event contracts that pricing information must clearly identify the products as contracts traded on a regulated exchange. Agency staff warned that displaying the products using American-style sportsbook odds could mislead customers about the nature of the transaction.
CFTC authority over event contracts remains under legal scrutiny
The Perez order treated the presidential mention contracts as event contracts, or swaps, under federal commodities law. The classification places his use of nonpublic government information within the CFTC’s enforcement framework under the Commodity Exchange Act.
At the same time, the scope of federal authority over prediction markets remains the subject of court disputes involving Kalshi and several U.S. states.
New York, Nevada and other states have challenged contracts offered through federally regulated prediction markets, particularly products tied to sports. Kalshi and the CFTC have argued in several proceedings that federally regulated event contracts fall within the commission’s jurisdiction, while state authorities have maintained that some products operate as gambling and remain subject to state law.
The CFTC used emergency authority in August to direct KalshiEX to continue normal operations after New York sought restrictions against the exchange. The agency said federal derivatives law gives it exclusive jurisdiction over event contracts traded on registered exchanges, while courts have reached different conclusions over the extent to which federal law preempts state gambling rules.
A separate regulatory dispute has spread across multiple states, with the CFTC filing actions or participating in proceedings involving state attempts to regulate prediction market contracts.
For Perez, the CFTC’s Aug. 28 settlement resolves the federal enforcement action without removing the financial consequences of the trades. He must surrender the full $107,539.02 generated from the activity, pay the discounted $65,000 penalty and remain out of CFTC-regulated trading for three years.
