Aletho News

Insider trading proves 9/11 foreknowledge

By Kit Klarenberg | Al Mayadeen | September 11, 2026

On September 12th 2001, chaos reigned supreme. Yet, as governments the world over struggled to make sense of the previous day’s catastrophe, and before a motive was established, any perpetrators identified, or other basic facts ascertained, the US Securities and Exchange Commission launched an investigation into potential insider trading by unknown figures with apparently precise foreknowledge of 9/11. The evidence seemed overwhelming. Mainstream journalists openly mocked the implausibility of numerous deeply abnormal stock market trades immediately prior to the attacks being pure coincidence.

For one, several companies prominently impacted by the event were abruptly ‘shorted’ at inexplicable levels over the preceding weeks. In other words, investors bet certain stocks would perform poorly in the near future, and sought to profit accordingly. For example, just five days before 9/11 over 2,000 shorts were placed against United Airlines – 90 times more in a single day than over the entirety of August. The company’s share price collapsed following the attacks, turning $180,000 in shorts into $2.4 million.

Meanwhile, substantial investments were serendipitously made in private security, intelligence and defence firms that benefited enormously from the 9/11 attacks and ensuing ‘War on Terror’. On September 10th, purchase of shares in major US defence contractor Raytheon surged sixfold. Just one week later, as the Pentagon began bulk purchasing Raytheon’s flagship Patriot and Tomahawk missiles in preparation for invading Afghanistan, the firm’s shares rocketed 37%. Other major defence stocks, including Boeing and Lockheed, also experienced abnormal trading pre-9/11.

Purchase and shorts of dozens of stocks in almost every conceivable industry that one way or another profited, or were harmed, as a result of 9/11 incongruously spiked in the weeks before the fateful day. The evidentiary trail was literally globespanning, with major financial authorities in several Western countries launching their own investigations. Numerous officials in European capitals alleged the trading was definitively indicative of 9/11 foreknowledge, and “terrorists” were responsible.

For example, commenting on Italian securities regulator CONSOB’s investigation into the suspicious market activity on September 17th 2001, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Martino boldly declared “terrorist states and organizations [were] behind speculation on the international markets.” One week later, German central bank President Ernst Welteke asserted his researchers had uncovered “irrefutable proof of insider trading.” He and his team were certain “people connected to the terrorists must have been trying to profit from this tragedy”:

“You look at the movements in markets before and after the attacks, it really makes your brow furrow… we are confident we will be able to pinpoint the source.”

Welteke declined to release further information, pending consultation with European and US regulators. However, the 9/11 insider trading scandal quickly faded from public consciousness thereafter. In July 2004, the SEC announced the end of its grand investigation – conducted in conjunction with the Department of Justice and FBI – having “not [developed] any evidence suggesting that anyone who had advance knowledge of the September 11 attacks traded on the basis of that information.” Which, rather than closing the case, begs the obvious question of who did.

Declassified records of one suspicious pre-9/11 trade probed by the FBI sheds potential light on why US and other authorities may have decided to leave the entire issue alone. From September 6th – 10th 2001, a total of 56,000 Stratesec shares were purchased by a single investor. The company provided security systems to several airports, including New York City’s Dulles from where one of the hijacked planes departed, and the World Trade Center. Its share price almost doubled in the attacks’ wake.

The shady trades were traced back to Wirt D. Walker III – a distant relative of the Bush family and business partner of Marvin Bush, then-President George W. Bush’s brother. The FBI reportedly uncovered “no ties to terrorism or other negative information” regarding Walker, so didn’t even interview him before concluding his lucrative transactions were innocent happenstance and closing the investigation. Apparently, the evident possibility Walker III possessed foreknowledge of 9/11 via other means than “ties to terrorism” wasn’t worth exploring.

Still, this sleight of hand granted the Bureau, Department of Justice and SEC an extremely effective “out”. The 9/11 Commission likewise summarily dismissed any suggestion of “unusual pre-9/11 trading activity” on the basis investors involved “had no conceivable ties to Al Qaeda.” Such specious reasoning was sufficient to kill the scandal dead in the mainstream. Nonetheless, ever since, numerous peer reviewed academic papers have contrarily concluded insider trading did occur, and was motivated by 9/11 foreknowledge.

In 2006, University of Illinois professor Allen Poteshman authored a well-cited study focusing on suspicious pre-9/11 trading activity in airline stocks. He concluded this shorting was “unusually high”, and “terrorists or their associates traded… on the basis of foreknowledge of the impending attacks.” Similar findings were reached by a 2011 Multinational Finance Journal paper, which identified highly abnormal market movements in numerous key industries, including insurance and reinsurance stocks directly impacted by 9/11. This was “consistent with insiders anticipating the 9-11 attacks.”

While the media failed to report on these studies, they were academically impactful, and cited as precedents in a December 2023 paper tracking peculiar Israeli stock market activity in the days preceding Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7th that year. Authored by two US scholars, they found a “significant spike” in the shorting of publicly listed Israeli companies days prior to that world-changing strike on the Zionist entity. This activity was “consistent with informed traders anticipating and profiting from the Hamas attack.”

The authors found shorting of Israeli companies listed on the Tel Aviv stock exchange “increased dramatically” before October 7th. Israeli stocks on major US exchanges also experienced a “sharp and unusual increase” during the same period. Shorting of publicly traded Zionist entity firms on October 2nd “far exceeded” levels of shorting witnessed at the start of COVID19 pandemic, which triggered a temporary global stock market collapse. No wonder the paper concludes it was “extremely unlikely the volume of short selling… occurred by random chance.”

“Random chance” seems an even less plausible explanation when one considers “similar patterns” of shorting Israeli stocks were also identified in early April 2023, right when Hamas was planning to conduct a comparable attack to Al-Aqsa Flood during Passover. In the immediate aftermath of October 7th too, a flurry of mainstream media reports exposed how Zionist Occupation Forces had numerous advance warnings of an impending Hamas attack for months prior. This included a detailed “point by point” battle plan, outlining Al-Aqsa Flood.

Fast forward to today, and Haaretz reveals UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed personally warned Benjamin Netanyahu 10 days prior to October 7th Hamas intended to wage a major offensive, but “Israel’s” premier failed to act. This disclosure comes at a time the mainstream media finally acknowledges the need for a complete reevaluation of what happened on 9/11. Any new investigation should surely focus on the insider trading angle – ascertaining who knew what when, and why, could unravel the entire conspiracy.

September 11, 2026 - Posted by aletho | Corruption, Deception | 9/11, Israel, United States