3月23日，当美国总统唐纳德·特朗普放弃打击伊朗发电厂的威胁时，石油、股票和其他市场随即掀起了一轮疯狂的买卖。
When U.S. President Donald Trump backed away from threats to strike Iranian power plants on March 23, it sparked a frenzy of buying and selling across oil, equities and other markets.
交易员们早已习惯于中东局势的发展引发价格剧烈波动。但这一次，一些押注者精准地把握了时机。在总统于“真相社交”上发帖宣布立场逆转前约15分钟，价值数十亿美元的合约被下达，押注油价将下跌、标普500指数将上涨，这引发了外界广泛猜测：是否有人掌握了不公平的优势。
Traders had grown accustomed to prices lurching wildly on developments in the Middle East. But this time, some bettors had timed it perfectly. Billions of dollars’ worth of contracts predicting oil would fall and the S&P 500 would rise were placed about 15 minutes before the president announced his U-turn in a post on Truth Social, fueling widespread speculation about whether someone had an unfair advantage.
调查这一事件的责任落在了美国商品期货交易委员会身上。这个联邦衍生品监管机构的职权范围——以及其知名度——随着加密货币和预测市场的兴起而大幅提升。在那里，一个由职业取证分析师组成的团队着手进行他们的常规工作：汇总当天赢家和输家的数据。
Responsibility for looking into the incident fell to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal derivatives regulator whose remit — and profile — has soared with the advent of cryptocurrencies and prediction markets. There, a team of career forensic analysts embarked on their usual task of pulling together data on the day’s winners and losers.