President Donald Trump kidnapped Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro over the weekend and claimed the U.S. would now control the country and take its oil. That caused the rest of the world to look around nervously to see where Trump is likely to invade next. If you’re in Greenland or Panama, it’s reasonable to be anxious. And the betting markets reflect that anxiety, as the odds for invasion have ticked up in recent days.
The question of whether Trump will “take back the Panama Canal” before the end of the president’s term in January 2029 is currently at 36% on Kalshi. That’s up from 28.8% on Jan. 2, the day before Maduro was kidnapped. The U.S. formerly had control of the Panama Canal when it was built over a century ago, though that command was relinquished in the 1970s.
Trump has previously said he wants to take back the Panama Canal, insisting it’s rightfully the property of the United States and cites Chinese interest in the region as his justification for reasserting American dominance in the area.
But it’s not just Panama. As CNBC notes, the odds of the U.S. taking control of “any part of Greenland” by the end of Trump’s term sit at 38% Tuesday on Kalshi, up from 30% on Jan. 2, though down from a recent high of 46.6% on Jan. 4, the day after Maduro was seized.
Trump has also become fixated on conquering Greenland, a territory of Denmark that the country has no interest in relinquishing control of, according to its leaders. The White House reiterated on Tuesday in a statement to Reuters that it was discussing options for “acquiring” Greenland.
“President Trump has made it well known that acquiring Greenland is a national security priority of the United States, and it’s vital to deter our adversaries in the Arctic region,” the White House told Reuters. “The president and his team are discussing a range of options to pursue this important foreign policy goal, and of course, utilizing the U.S. military is always an option at the commander-in-chief’s disposal.”
Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said Monday that Trump’s threats to annex Greenland were creating unacceptable pressure but that she thinks the president means it. Frederiksen warned that any attack on Greenland would be the end of the NATO alliance.
“If the United States were to choose to attack another NATO country, then everything would come to an end,” she told Danish journalists, according to a translation from the New York Times. “The international community as we know it, democratic rules of the game, NATO, the world’s strongest defensive alliance — all of that would collapse if one NATO country chose to attack another.”
The Wall Street Journal reports that Secretary of State Marco Rubio told lawmakers behind closed doors on Monday that Trump’s ultimate goal is to buy Greenland and that threatening invasion was just a pressure tactic. But Democratic lawmakers have also noted that defense officials swore up and down that there were no plans for regime change in Venezuela before Trump kidnapped Maduro.
Trump has also made threats against Canada, historically America’s most steadfast ally. The president’s hostility to Canada, including high tariffs, has created an atmosphere of anti-American sentiment in the country that’s unheard of in modern times. And it’s hitting American businesses in a serious way, with travel to the U.S. down considerably and alcohol exports crippled. There was a 91% drop in U.S. wine exports to Canada in the three months from March to July, according to Wine Enthusiast. And Jim Beam has halted production at its main distillery in Kentucky for the year due to sagging sales. Canadian drinkers have switched to their own domestic whiskeys as they boycott U.S. bourbon.
If you’re thinking about making a bet on whether Trump will invade Greenland or Panama or any other country, it’s probably a good idea to read the fine print. Some people are unhappy with Polymarket after a bet wasn’t paid out over an “invasion” of Venezuela, according to Marketwatch.
“This market refers to U.S. military operations intended to establish control,” the company explained. “President Trump’s statement that they will ‘run’ Venezuela while referencing ongoing talks with the Venezuelan government does not alone qualify the snatch-and-extract mission to capture Maduro as an invasion.”
There’s also the possibility that you’re betting against people with a lot of insider info that you don’t have. That seems to have been the case shortly before Maduro was kidnapped, as someone turned $30,000 bet on that happening into a $400,000 windfall. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong recently said he’s still making up his mind about whether insider trading on prediction markets is good or bad.
“If you’re optimizing for it as a trading and asset class and you want to make sure you preserve the integrity of the market, I’d say, no, you shouldn’t have any insider trading,” Armstrong said. “But if you’re actually optimizing it for a source of news and what is really going to happen in the world, you 100% want insider trading because that’s where you get real signal.”
Even if you’re right about Trump invading this country or that country, there are plenty of loopholes that could see you not getting paid or potentially getting screwed by insider trading. And if you’re an American, there’s probably some poetic justice in getting screwed. Because, like it or not, Americans are the ones who put this fascist freak in charge of the government again. And he’s bent on territorial expansion, no matter what the rest of the world has to say about it.
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