Insider betting: Will Trump declare a ceasefire by the end of April?

The recent developments in the U.S.-Iran conflict have been escalating continuously over the past week.

The U.S. 82nd Airborne Division canceled its “Joint Readiness Training Center” rotation, the typically sea-freighted 82nd Combat Aviation Brigade was airlifted, and the blood bank reserves at U.S. military bases in the Middle East increased by 500%. The largest overseas hospital of the U.S. Department of Defense — the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany — suspended some civilian services.

The last time this combination of actions occurred was on the eve of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.

In this highly tense atmosphere, Trump suddenly posted that the U.S. and Iran had engaged in “very, very good and productive dialogue” and announced that the U.S. would pause military strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure for five days. In the early hours of March 27, Beijing time, Trump again posted that the pause would be extended until April 6.

The stark contrast between this objective reality and Trump’s statements adds significant difficulty to analyzing the situation.

However, beyond these public declarations, there is another channel of information known as the “prediction market,” which attempts to translate capital flows into interpretations of event developments, providing the world with a new perspective for information analysis.

In recent days, money has begun to concentrate in the same direction.

Several insider accounts “pick sides” for an impending ceasefire

In the prediction market, there is a trading event created just three weeks ago with a transaction volume exceeding $50 million: “Will the U.S. vs Iran ceasefire before ___ month ___ day?” If two people with differing views on this market can reach an agreement on “probability,” it will form matched trades and corresponding event occurrence probabilities.

The market has a very clear definition of “ceasefire”: both sides publicly announce a halt to direct military hostilities. Given the escalating conflict mentioned earlier, most people would think that, under all signs of escalating military tensions, a ceasefire is a low-probability event with little hope.

Just as the public thinks, the probability of a ceasefire before April 30 is around 38%, while the probability of a ceasefire before March 31 is only 5%. Many even believe this probability should be lower—those who “overestimate” the likelihood of a ceasefire are mostly gamblers who haven’t even looked at recent news headlines and are just “taking a chance.”

But among these “gamblers,” there are six accounts that appear to be highly suspicious. Their total profit of $1.8 million comes entirely from accurately predicting the timing of “U.S.-Israel strikes on Iran” and “Israel-Hamas ceasefires” during 2025, as well as the outbreak of the current Iranian conflict and the assassination of Iran’s former Supreme Leader Khamenei.

This series of seemingly miraculous predictions is not their only commonality. As of March 27, they had cumulatively invested $285,000, confident that the U.S. and Iran would ceasefire before April 30, with $185,000 in the market for “U.S.-Iran ceasefire before March 31.”

If these six accounts can really “foresee the future,” then we can reverse-engineer their positions by using “foreknowledge of the ceasefire” to deduce their stances.

Why would Iran want to ceasefire?

This may be the moment when Iran holds the strongest negotiating position and the most leverage in this war: the blockade of Hormuz has driven up global oil prices, no other countries are directly involved in the strikes aside from the U.S. and Israel, and the narrative of resistance and patriotism brought by the new leadership has united public sentiment.

Conversely, if the fighting continues, a series of countermeasures, such as the gradual shift of pro-U.S. Gulf states like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, the ongoing depletion of Iran’s military capabilities, and the development of alternative shipping routes through Hormuz, will lead Iran to lose its dominant position at the negotiating table.

At this point, it is necessary to mention a very sharp question: on the eve of this war, the U.S. and Iran were negotiating in Geneva, and the progress was described by various parties as “productive,” even “a historic agreement within reach.”

However, while negotiations were still underway, the U.S. and Israel launched a surprise attack on Iran. With this historical precedent, how can Iran trust that the U.S. will honor a ceasefire promise?

This relates to the nature of the ceasefire itself: for Iran, the ceasefire is not a matter of trust but a matter of calculating interests. If the agreement is reached and the U.S. tears it up again, Iran will further solidify the narrative of “the U.S. being unreliable” on the international stage; if the agreement is honored, Iran can secure the most favorable negotiation outcome at this time.

This also explains why, although Iran has publicly stated “no negotiations,” it has maintained information flow through various intermediary channels and specifically proposed counterproposals. Public statements are performances for the domestic audience, while actual contacts are aimed at securing the best exit conditions.

Additionally, Iran’s network of proxies has already faced issues such as organizational fragmentation and ammunition depletion in this round of warfare. Coupled with its domestic economy being on the brink of collapse even before the war (the Iranian rial has depreciated nearly 90% compared to 2018), withdrawing at a good time may be their optimal solution.

The U.S., being the farthest from the battlefield, wants the ceasefire the most

With the war nearing a month, the S&P 500 index has fallen since before the conflict, and the Dow Jones has seen four consecutive weeks of declines, creating the longest streak of losses in three years; gasoline prices have soared from $2.98 before the conflict to $3.98, rising over 30% in three weeks; the 30-year fixed mortgage rate has increased by a full half percentage point; Goldman Sachs has raised the probability of recession to 30%.

These core data have limited short-term impact on the average American, but for Trump, they are fatal — the stock market and WTI oil prices are core indicators of his administration’s performance.

At this time, the ideal tool for the U.S. government — the Strategic Petroleum Reserve — is losing effectiveness due to aging facilities. Since this system was designed after the oil crisis in 1975 with a design life of only 25 years, its actual sustainable release capacity may be only half of what is officially advertised, or even lower.

More critically, extracting crude oil further dissolves the internal structure of the salt caverns, meaning that large-scale releases will also accelerate the aging of the system. While releasing reserves can help stabilize market sentiment for Trump in the short term, if the conflict prolongs, the drawbacks of this countermeasure may manifest as soaring oil prices on the candlestick charts.

In addition to financial data, U.S. domestic politics are also a factor Trump must weigh in this round of warfare. When the Iraq War began, Bush’s approval rating was as high as 72%; when the Afghanistan War started, his approval rating exceeded 90%.

However, on the first day of this conflict, Trump’s approval rating was below 40%. Even the classic “rally-around-the-flag effect” — where a president’s approval rating rebounds due to the outbreak of a war — has not appeared in this round of strikes. As of March 25, Trump’s overall approval rating had fallen to 36%, setting a record low for his second term.

Combined with his campaign promise of “No New Wars,” Trump’s current performance on the U.S. political stage not only jeopardizes the prospects of his core circle in this year’s midterm elections but also erodes the entire Republican camp’s discourse power in the 2028 presidential election.

On the other hand, Trump has also set a hard deadline of May 14 for himself. Due to the need to “stay in Washington to handle current combat operations,” he postponed his originally scheduled trip to China next week and publicly stated yesterday that the trip would be extended to May 14.

It is foreseeable that Trump needs to present himself as a “winner,” rather than a “president stuck in the Middle Eastern quagmire,” when he goes to Beijing.

Everything is changing, but TACO will not change

There is currently a term specifically describing Trump’s sudden announcement of positive progress after extreme pressure: TACO. Its full name is Trump Always Chickens Out.

However, in the current tense geopolitical situation in the Middle East, many believe he will not TACO, nor will he be able to successfully persuade Iran to agree to a ceasefire.

Three months ago, if someone told you that Trump would bring Venezuelan President Maduro back to a U.S. court like catching a chick, threaten European allies with Greenland as a tariff bargaining chip at the Davos World Economic Forum, and assassinate Iran’s highest leader while negotiating with Iran —

These events, previously thought to have less than a 1% probability, have all happened. Now, what we are looking at in the future is whether the extremely low-probability U.S.-Iran ceasefire TACO will unfold as scheduled in the coming month.