Arrest of Venezuelan president appears to have been anticipated on ‘prediction markets’ where people bet on future events
Gamblers appear to have made large profits after successfully betting on the capture of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro.
Ahead of Donald Trump’s shock announcement on Saturday morning, traders seemed to have anticipated Maduro’s political demise by placing timely wagers on so-called “prediction markets”.
Prediction markets are online gambling platforms that allow individuals to bet against each other on a range of markets that have been created by the host website.
They are typically binary bets – for example, punting on yes/no or higher/lower outcomes – with the markets ranging from the identity of the next Republican US presidential nominee (JD Vance/Marco Rubio) to wagers on whether the S&P 500 index will rise or fall on a particular trading day on Wall Street.
