Suspicious Timing

Major political announcements move markets. These are congressional trades that happened in the 10 days before those announcements, in the exact stocks and sectors that were affected. Trades made after are excluded - that's just public information. What's left is the suspicious part.

Events Tracked

Correlated Trades

Politicians Involved

10d

Days Before Event

All Events (44) Iran / Oil (3) Tariffs (2) Defense (3) Committee Conflict (20) Tax Strategy (1) Mega Trades (9) Earnings (1) Geopolitical (2) Prediction Markets (2) COVID-19 (1)

How this works

For each major political event, we search our database of 41,860 congressional trade disclosures for any trades in affected tickers in the 10 days before the event. We only show trades made before the announcement - trades made after are irrelevant since the information was already public. A trade before an event could mean foresight, routine portfolio activity, or pure coincidence. We flag the timing - you decide what it means.

Defense Mar 19, 2026

Ro Khanna buys BWXT (nuclear defense) before Iran escalation

Ro Khanna's child purchased BWXT (BWX Technologies - nuclear tech and defense contractor) on March 19, 4 days before the March 23 Iran military announcement. BWXT provides nuclear propulsion for Navy submarines and carriers, directly relevant to Middle East military operations.

Market impact: Defense stocks saw increased volatility around the Iran escalation.

Source: Congressional filings

Congressional trades in the 10 days before 2 found

Timing	Politician	Tickers	Action	# Trades	Est. Value	Owner(s)
Same day Mar 19, 2026	Maria Elvira Salazar Rep	BA	Buy	2	$41K	Not disclosed
Same day Mar 19, 2026	Ro Khanna Dem	BWXT	Buy	1	$33K	Child

Defense Mar 18, 2026

Greg Steube makes first congressional IonQ trade weeks before DARPA quantum contract

Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL) purchased IonQ (IONQ) stock on March 18, 2026, the first recorded congressional trade in the quantum computing firm. Approximately four weeks later, on April 14, IonQ announced selection for DARPA's Heterogeneous Architectures for Quantum (HARQ) program, a defense-research contract that sent shares up 20.2% in a single session. The temporal correlation between a freshman congressional position and a subsequent defense contract award is a pattern worth examining, and was independently flagged by QuiverQuant.

Market impact: IONQ closed up 20.2% on April 14, 2026, the day DARPA HARQ selection was announced.

Source: QuiverQuant / IonQ press release

Congressional trades in the 10 days before 1 found

Timing	Politician	Tickers	Action	# Trades	Est. Value	Owner(s)
Same day Mar 18, 2026	Greg Steube Rep	IONQ	Buy	1	$8K	Spouse

Defense Dec 15, 2025

Pentagon budget increase announcement expected

Increased defense spending was widely anticipated in the FY2026 budget. Congressional Armed Services Committee members had advance knowledge of specific contractor allocations.

Market impact: Defense stocks rallied on the budget confirmation.

Source: Congressional budget process

Congressional trades in the 10 days before 1 found

Timing	Politician	Tickers	Action	# Trades	Est. Value	Owner(s)
6d before Dec 9, 2025	David Rouzer Rep	BA	Sell	1	$8K	Not disclosed

A note on what this page shows

This page maps publicly disclosed congressional trades against documented political events. A trade near an event is not proof of wrongdoing - members of Congress trade frequently, and coincidences happen. What matters is the pattern: when the same sectors and tickers keep appearing in the days before market-moving announcements, the question shifts from "is this suspicious?" to "how often does this happen?"

The larger suspicious trading incidents (the $580M pre-dawn oil futures bet, the $950M ceasefire trade) involve anonymous market participants - not necessarily Congress members. We include those events for context because they show the environment in which congressional trading happens.