Google security engineer arrested and charged with insider trading on Polymarket

Odaily News Court documents released by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York reveal that Google security engineer Michele Spagnuolo has been arrested and charged with using material non-public information to place bets on Polymarket related to Google user search results.



According to the court documents, Spagnuolo used internal Google tools to track the list of the most searched-for individuals in 2025 and transferred approximately 3.8 million USDC to a Polymarket address. His associated account, AlphaRaccoon, placed bets on D4vd becoming one of the most searched-for individuals in late November just hours after accessing the internal tools.



The documents further allege that AlphaRaccoon transferred 5 million USDC.e from a Polymarket account to a wallet, and subsequently moved the funds through exchange services and privacy tools, with some of the funds ultimately ending up in an account at a payment processing institution in Italy. Spagnuolo is accused of profiting over $1.2 million from these transactions and currently faces charges of commodities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering.