TLDR
- Studios and production companies are warning staff not to bet on prediction markets tied to their work.
- Banned bets include casting, studio earnings, release dates, and award nominations.
- A study found 210,000 suspicious bets earned $143 million on Polymarket over two years.
- Experts say blockchain-based bets can be “basically impossible” to trace.
- BetOnline briefly pulled its next James Bond market over fears of a leak.
Hollywood studios are telling staff to stay off prediction markets. The bigger question is whether those rules can be enforced, since experts say tracing bets to individual employees is very hard.
The Hollywood Reporter reported the new guidelines on November 5. Studios and production companies have been quietly warning employees not to bet on news tied to their jobs.
The warnings cover bets on studio earnings, casting decisions, and release dates. Employees are also barred from passing private information to friends or family so they can place bets.
At least one company has set up an anonymous hotline. Staff can use it to report coworkers they suspect of placing bets.
PMC, the parent company of The Hollywood Reporter, Variety, and Deadline, also updated its handbook in recent weeks. It now bans betting on “award nominations, casting decisions, production timelines and release dates.”
The new rules build on long-standing bans on insider trading in the stock market. “You now have, essentially, an explosion in the number of employers who have to think about insider trading rules,” said Columbia Law School professor Joshua Mitts.
Why Enforcement Is Hard
Mitts studies prediction market trading. He says most informed trading is “very difficult, if not impossible, to detect.”
He pointed to blockchain-based platforms as a particular challenge. Mitts said a trader who uses a mixer and hides behind several layers of intermediaries can be “basically impossible” to catch.
Mitts and Moran Ofir of the University of Haifa published a study in March on Polymarket. They found about 210,000 suspicious bets between February 2024 and February 2026 that earned $143 million in profit.
Those accounts won 70% of the time. Mitts said that rate was “well in excess of chance.”
In February, six newly created Polymarket wallets earned $1.2 million betting on U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran. No one has been caught.
Mitts said platforms have reasons to police themselves. “If you become known as the platform where all the insiders trade, then your average customer won’t want to trade there,” he said.
Cases Already Caught
Some insiders have been caught. In February, Kalshi disclosed that a video editor at MrBeast’s company made $5,000 using confidential information about MrBeast content. He was fired and fined $20,000.
In April, a Puck column revealed that a worker on a CBS competition show had been profiting from prediction markets. A TV network source told THR that markets on what guests will say on pretaped talk shows remain open to insider bets.
Entertainment markets now cover a wide range of events. Traders can bet on the Oscar for Best Picture, the Season 35 winner of “Dancing with the Stars,” and whether Donald Trump will appear on “Saturday Night Live.”
Under the Onion Futures Act of 1958, Congress banned only two kinds of contracts: onion futures and motion picture box office receipts. Over the summer, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission asked the public what should be allowed. It said award show bets should be permitted but raised questions about game shows and reality competitions.
Some comments to the CFTC said the winner of the last season of “Survivor” appeared to be tagged early by aggressive bets. This week, betting site BetOnline temporarily pulled its market on who will be the next James Bond. A representative said “sharp money” suddenly backed Callum Turner over longtime favorite Jack Lowden, raising concern about a leak, though the role has not been confirmed.
