Gabriel Perez, Donald Trump's teleprompter operator at the White House, managed to turn his access to presidential speech texts into $100,000 in profit on the Kalshi prediction market platform. This is a striking example of how insider information can be monetized in rapidly growing prediction markets.
Perez has worked with Trump's teleprompter since 2016. His unique position allowed him to see the text of the president's speeches in advance, giving him a massive advantage when betting on which words or topics would appear in public addresses. On the Kalshi platform, there are Mentions markets where users place bets on the appearance of specific words or topics.
According to the investigation, Perez executed trades on more than a dozen of Trump's speeches over three months, including the February State of the Union address. The strategy was simple but risky: he opened positions based on the pre-known text, but was often forced to close them during the speech itself if the president deviated from the script—and Trump, as is well known, improvises in about 80% of cases.
Kalshi's oversight team noticed suspicious activity and immediately contacted the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). "Our team quickly flagged these trades and passed the information to the regulator—we are cooperating and providing assistance," said Kalshi's head of compliance, Bobby Deno.
Prediction Markets Under Regulatory Scrutiny
This incident comes amid tightening oversight of prediction markets. Several weeks ago, Kalshi launched three market protection tools—risk scoring and employment verification systems. The company's report indicates that screening tools blocked over 100 suspicious insider trading transactions in the first quarter of 2026. During the same period, more than 150 investigations were initiated, and over 20 cases were referred to law enforcement.
The platform has already introduced an employer disclosure rule amid pressure from the White House. In March, the presidential administration warned employees against betting related to internal information. Despite this, Perez remains Trump's teleprompter operator to this day.
The Manhattan District Attorney's office declined to pursue criminal charges. Most likely, the CFTC will offer a settlement: Perez will return the profits and cease such trades. He was not the first—previously, a U.S. Army soldier turned $33,000 into $410,000 on Polymarket using secret information about Maduro.
Even Wall Street is wary of the issue. Recently, Goldman Sachs restricted employee participation in bets on Kalshi and Polymarket.
Expert commentary from Cryptalist: This case is just the tip of the iceberg. Prediction markets, despite their innovativeness, are becoming an ideal environment for insider trading, especially in the political sphere. Platforms will have to implement much stricter user verification and trade monitoring mechanisms, or regulators may strike the entire industry. Kalshi's current measures are only a first step, and they are clearly overdue.