White House employees received a warning against placing bets using insider information, WSJ reports. Suspicious trades preceded Trump's post on Iran in March.
The White House warned its employees against using their official positions to engage in trading on the futures markets. This was reported on Thursday, April 9, by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), citing sources. The authenticity of the warning was also confirmed by the White House, WSJ specified.
Journalists claim that an email with this directive was sent out on March 24 - the day after U.S. President Donald Trump announced on the social media platform Truth Social that he would order the military to postpone any strikes on Iranian power plants and energy infrastructure.
Suspicious Trades Following Trump's Post on Iran
Earlier, The Financial Times reported that suspicious trades in oil futures worth hundreds of millions of dollars occurred just 15 minutes before Trump published this post. Between 6:49 and 6:50 local time, more than 6,200 operations were conducted with Brent and WTI oil futures totaling approximately $850 million. Trump's post appeared at 7:04.
At that time, the White House rejected suspicions of insider information leaks. Deputy Press Secretary Kush Desai stated that the administration would not tolerate the illegal use of official positions.
