Google Engineer Peeked at Year in Search Then Monetized Inside Info on Polymarket Bond Late

Google Engineer Peeked at Year in Search Then Monetized Inside Info on Polymarket Bond Late by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack SDNY COURTHOUSE, June 11 – On May 27 DOJ announced "the unsealing of a complaint charging MICHELE SPAGNUOLO, a/k/a 'AlphaRaccoon,; a software engineer at Google, with commodities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering arising from his scheme to misappropriate confidential information from his employer and use that information to place a series of profitable Google-related trades on a prediction market platform."   The platform, as in another recent SDNY case, was Polymarket. The Complaint says, "SPAGNUOLO’s AlphaRaccoon account wagered: approximately $937,688 on the “NO” side of “Will Bianca Censori be the #1 searched person on Google this year?” at average implied probability of approximately 85%; approximately $613,587 on the “NO” side of “Will Pope Leo XIV be the #1 searched person on Google this year?” at average implied probability of approximately 56%; approximately $509,149 on the “NO” side of “Will Donald Trump be the #1 searched person on Google this year?” at average implied probability of approximately 90%; and approximately $171,612 on the “NO” side of “Will Donald Trump rank in Google’s Top 5 Most Searched People of 2025?” at average implied probability of approximately 66%. In total, from on or about October 15, 2025, through on or about December 4, 2025, SPAGNUOLO’s AlphaRaccoon account risked approximately $2,754,092 on approximately 25 Google Year in Search 2025 outcomes that the market treated as unlikely. Google officially and publicly announced its Year in Search 2025 results on or about December 4, 2025. Soon after it did so, SPAGNUOLO’s AlphaRaccoon account, profited approximately $1.2 million on his Google Year in Search 2025-related bets. On May 29 for Spagmuolo a notice of appearance filed by Shawn Crowley, who we've previously covered representing E. Jean Carroll and the witness known as Mia in the US v. Sean Combs. That was pro bono; this is retained. On June 11 Crowley wrote in to Judge Netburn asking to extend the time to post the $1 million bond - the final $75,000 are en route but not yet arrived. Another reason to pay with crypto / stablecoins rather than bank wire transfers? The Government did not object.   The case is USA v. Spagnuolo, 1:26-mj-2020  (Netburn)  *** Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron. Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com Mail: Box 130222, Chinatown Station, NY NY 10013 Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.  Copyright 2006-2026 Inner City Press, Inc. To request reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com