Was the Nobel Peace Prize leaked?

Just hours before Venezuela’s Maria Corina Machado was declared the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize winner, something strange happened online.

On Polymarket, a popular betting platform, her odds of winning suddenly shot up, from 3.75 per cent to nearly 73 per cent overnight between Thursday and Friday.

What made this jump even more surprising was that no media outlet or expert had listed her as a likely contender. Yet, just a few hours later, her name was officially announced in Oslo as this year’s laureate.

The sudden surge in bets has now raised suspicions, with the Nobel Committee launching a probe to find out if the result was leaked before the official announcement.

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If true, it would be a serious breach of the strict secrecy surrounding the Nobel Peace Prize, and could tarnish the image of one of the world’s most respected honours.

Here’s all you need to know about the matter

How Machado became the frontrunner

Just hours before the Nobel Peace Prize announcement, Machado’s odds on Polymarket shot up in a way that caught many by surprise.

Two Norwegian newspapers, Aftenposten and Finansavisen, reported unusual activity on the site late Thursday night, well before her name was officially announced in Oslo.

At first, Machado’s chance of winning was listed behind Yulia Navalnaya, the economist and widow of former Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who led the odds against all other prospective winners on Polymarket. Less than two hours later, however, the Venezuelan opposition leader was a top contender.

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“We take this very seriously,” Kristian Berg Harpviken, director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute, told Bloomberg. “It seems we have been prey to a criminal actor who wants to earn money on our information.”

The betting platform allows users to bet on the outcome of real-world events, ranging from sports games and economic decisions to the most played track on Taylor Swift’s latest album.

In major prediction markets, traders buy “yes” or “no” shares tracking the outcome of an event. The amount of buying and selling of those instruments determines the implied probability, and therefore the price, of each outcome at any point in time.

According to Finansavisen, in one instance, a user reportedly won more than $65,000 after betting on Machado’s victory, and another winning account had been created the same day it placed its bet.

“You don’t normally see this in the betting market. It’s very suspicious,” a data specialist, Robert Naess, told Norwegian broadcaster NRK. The betting platform is yet to respond to the matter.

Machado, an opposition leader barred from running in Venezuela’s 2024 presidential election, was awarded “for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy”, the Nobel committee said.

Also read: Norway braces for Trump backlash if he fails to win the Nobel Peace Prize

How Nobel Prize winners are picked?

The process of choosing a Nobel Peace Prize laureate is famously secretive.

Each year, the Nobel Committee in Oslo invites thousands of qualified individuals and organisations to submit nominations, including members of national governments, university professors, and previous laureates. Nominations are kept strictly confidential for 50 years, and the committee does not disclose who is under consideration.

Once nominations are in, committee members review the submissions, consult with experts, and deliberate extensively to decide the winner.

According to the Nobel Prize official website, the final decision is made by the Norwegian Nobel Committee, and the results are announced publicly only at the award ceremony in Oslo.

“The secrecy surrounding the nominations and deliberations is designed to protect the integrity of the prize and prevent outside influence,” the Nobel Prize website notes.

The Nobel Institute’s Harpviken said he doesn’t remember any similar events regarding the peace prize, even though there had been “some leaks” about 15 years ago, “when more people had information about the winners before the announcement.”

“We will look closely at this to find out what has happened,” he said. “Secrecy for us is very important.”

With input from agencies