The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against Michele Spagnuolo, a resident of Switzerland, alleging insider trading on Polymarket.com. The agency claims Spagnuolo used sensitive nonpublic information about Google’s official 2025 Year in Search list to trade prediction market contracts and is seeking restitution, disgorgement, civil monetary penalties, trading and registration bans, and a permanent injunction for alleged violations of the Commodity Exchange Act and CFTC regulations. According to the complaint, Spagnuolo was a Google software engineer who obtained the information through his employment and then traded from at least October 2025 through at least December 2025 in at least 23 Year in Search-related contracts, including markets on the top searched person and the top five most searched people on Google in 2025. The CFTC alleges he traded with near-perfect accuracy under the Polymarket handle AlphaRaccoon and generated approximately USD 1.2 million in profits. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York has also announced the unsealing of a criminal complaint in the same court alleging similar conduct.
Commodity Futures Trading Commission2026-05-27
Commodity Futures Trading Commission files insider trading case against Google employee over alleged Polymarket profits of about USD 1.2 million
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has filed a civil enforcement action in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against Swiss resident and former Google software engineer Michele Spagnuolo, alleging insider trading on Polymarket.com using nonpublic information about Google’s 2025 “Year in Search” list. The CFTC claims he traded at least 23 related prediction market contracts with near-perfect accuracy under the handle AlphaRaccoon, generating about USD 1.2 million in profits, and seeks restitution, disgorgement, civil monetary penalties, and a permanent injunction.