A software engineer used confidential workplace data to bet $2.7m on Polymarket – and it's a warning for every HR and compliance team
The criminal case against a Google software engineer accused of earning roughly $1.2 million through Polymarket bets is drawing attention to a compliance issue that extends beyond traditional securities markets: the use of confidential workplace information in prediction markets.
Federal prosecutors allege that Michele Spagnuolo, a 36-year-old Google software engineer and Italian citizen living in Switzerland, used internal company data to place bets on Google’s annual Year in Search rankings before the information was released publicly. The allegations were detailed in a criminal complaint unsealed Wednesday in federal court in Manhattan.
According to the complaint, Spagnuolo used a Polymarket account known as “AlphaRaccoon” to place a series of “yes” and “no” wagers tied to which public figures would appear in Google’s most-searched rankings.
Prosecutors allege that he accessed confidential search trend information through an internal Google software tool displaying a “Google Confidential” banner and used that data to place approximately $2.7 million in bets between October and December.
“Unlike the counterparties to his trades, Spagnuolo knew the outcome of these wagers before the trading public did because he had accessed Google’s confidential, commercially valuable internal data,” authorities alleged...
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