Beware! KeyMarkets is an offshore broker! Your investment may be at risk.
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KeyMarkets is a Forex brokerage registered in the Marshall Islands. It provides the MT4 trading platform and an extremely generous leverage of up to 1:300. Furthermore, there is a wide range of trading products from which to choose and a required minimum deposit of $250 which is just about the industry average. The spread on EUR/USD comes at 1.5 pips which is nothing out of the ordinary in Forex trading.
KeyMarkets regulation & safety of funds
According to the website the company behind the brokerage is registered in the Marshall Islands by the name Key Markets Limited with a standard address we have seen with countless other brokerages. Here is a screenshot:
The Marshall Islands has become a top-destination for would-be scammers due to its very liberal laws regarding the registering of companies. The government does not even require for someone to be physically there in order to register a company. Such a loophole has surely been noticed by many ill-minded brokers and utilized. Nonetheless, it’s safe to assume that Key Markets Limited, irrespective of its legitimacy, does not fall under any regulatory oversight because the government of the Marshall Islands does not include Forex trading within its regulatory framework.
Putting that aside, the brokerage the MetaTrader 4 trading platform, including a web version which we got a look at through a demo account. Here is a screenshot:
We could see a spread of 1.5 pips on EUR/USD which is about the industry average in Forex trading and in favor for potential clients of the broker. The leverage extended to traders is 1:300 which is both generous and balanced. The required minimum deposit also isn’t excessive and quite normal at $250. However, the offshore location of the brokerage and the obvious lack of regulation highly inclines us to suspect that potential clients of the brokerage may be open to substantial risk.
Traders needn’t have to worry themselves with such risk if they choose to trade with a brokerage regulated and authorized by a prestigious regulatory agency. Such agencies are the FCA in the UK or CySec in Cyprus which have been leading names in Forex trading for some time now. Their regulatory framework is composed of a number of strict rules which prevent clients from falling victims to fraud. Such rules include the segregation of accounts which assures that commingling with the client’s money is not possible. Furthermore, a license by such a regulatory body entails participation in a financial mechanism by which clients may be compensated if they suffer losses due to fraud or bankruptcy. With the FCA the compensation is up to 50 000 GBP, where as with CySEC it is up to 20 000 EUR per person
KeyMarkets deposit/withdrawal methods and fees
Potential clients of the brokerage may deposit or withdraw via the standard Visa and MasterCard, as well as Sofort and cryptos such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.
In the terms and conditions of the brokerage we did find troubling withdrawal conditions. Here is a screenshot:
As you can see for yourself – the brokerage explicitly states that there is an administrative fee of $50 for accounts with low trading activity.” Furthermore, we encountered also another provision of interest. Here is a screenshot:
There is a minimum withdrawal amount of $50. Such provisions should not be present in the terms and conditions of a legitimate brokerage. This is why we always advise traders to put up only the required minimum deposit, instead of risking a bigger amount with no certainty. Afterwards, they may also try to withdraw a small amount in order to check for any unexpected fees or delays. Such fees and delays are usually the signs of a scammer.
How does the scam work?
Unfortunately, the possibility of a scam looms over almost every trade in forex, especially if you are dealing with an unregulated brokerage. That is why we believe traders should be acquainted with the methods of a scam. Here is how it would typically go about:
Through clicking an ad with promises for fast money, you will be redirected to a website such as Bitcoin Evolution or Crypto Cash where registration will require you to give your address, email and phone number. After sharing your personal information, you will being receiving calls from brokers, compelling you to invest with them and win big. After a few minutes hearing their pitches, you decide to deposit some $200-250. And just like that – the scammers take a fat commission from this initial deposit.
After they are done with you, senior scammers begin working you into putting even more money. They say it’s the only way to profit from trading even more. After making the mistake of investing even further, you’ll begin wanting to get out of this and withdraw what you have left.
Unfortunately, the con-artists have no such thing in mind. They will now begin persuading you to wait it out and not withdraw right now. The motive here is quite straightforward – traders have a limited time window for filing a chargeback with their bank and get their money back. The “recovery department” will simply want to mislead you into missing this crucial period and, along the way, losing any chance you might have of getting the money back.
What to do when scammed?
As was mentioned above, scamming is quite the common in the trading world and, sadly, even you might suffer from it. In such an unfortunate case there still may be some available options for you.
You may contact your bank or credit card provider and file a chargeback. Furthermore, due to the high instances of fraud – both Visa and MasterCard have decided to sidestep scammers as best they can in Forex trading. The first thing we have seen so far is that MasterCard has increased the previous time period of six months for filing a chargeback to a year and a half with their rival Visa expected to follow suit in December.
If, however, you have provided the broker with your credit card details, immediately cancel your credit card.
If you have given information regarding your online banking pass – you should switch it asap!
Beware of potential calls from self-described “recovery agencies”! They prey on scammed and vulnerable traders who are desperate to recover their losses. They will require an “up-front” payment to help you, but after paying them, no such help will be coming your way!
Jimmy
THIS COMPANY IS A TOTAL SCAM.
DO NOT INVEST.
I have lost 36,000 GBP after legitimatley believing that it was a good honest company.
It is not regulated and full of lies about profits, trades and need for capital.
The agents even open and close trades without consent. This is illegal!
DO NOT INVEST. SPREAD THE NEWS about key-markets.com
The truth
Exactly !!
Terrible scammers
I lost a lot of money
Derek Anderson and Lewis Cooper and all of them
These people should be rotting in a prison somewhere
Evil beyond belief.
Do not trust them one bit
roger v
I am frantically attempting to get my £260 off key-traders. Despite my continued complaints, they are still trying to get me to continue !! I appear to be going round in an endless circle, with nobody willing to address my complaint and sort out crediting the monies back to my account!
When I originally expressed interest in the company, I did read up on key-traders and all appears to be legit – Seriously having second thoughts !!!
Choannah
Yes. I too have experienced bullshit. After doing research I believed it was legitimate but wanted to proceed with precaution. The broker was helping me to trade in small amounts but I complained that it was really a waste of time because the trades were small so he suggested that I trade NASDAQ and wanted me to invest a minimum of £7,000. I told him if I will invest after I withdraw (I wanted to see how easy it would be to withdraw, after all if I was going to Invest big i better be able to take out small money).
Any way going round in circles to take out out the initial deposit. The support team keep saying that because I missed the call to verify the withdrawal I have to apply again. This is a lie! No one is calling I even had to submit another utility bill. Now they are not responding to my emails and the bogus contact number keeps going to an automated voice message.
My broker says he no longer working with me lol because I have wasted enough of his time (meaning I am taking too long to part with a large amount of money on NASDAQ).
Please, please do not INVEST – key-markets.com is a waste of your time, energy and a complete scam in my opinion. At this point in time all I can do is get a charge back.
Hope you all recover your investments and i wish you all the best.
Patrick A
What was the name of the broker? I had just the same conversation today with the same keywords i.e. wasting his time, small account, etc.
jane
I had the same, wanted to see a small amount of money back and see how this goes. Now they say I need to increase my limit with 5000 euro first to get money back. Did anybody got anything back at all???
The truth
Total shit company
Derek Anderson , Lewis Cooper , com artists
Stay away!
roger v
As at 14 June, I am still trying to get my money back ! The latest contact is my “broker” a person calling himself DANIEL GOLDSTEIN”! I now refuse to speak to him, or any other person at key-markets. Only by email, whilst he keeps wanting to CHAT to me. My response is always in the same vein – ” I WANT MY MONEY BACK!” I am polite, but will not engage in general chit chat. Sadly, still going round and round, but if I do not receive any reply within a couple or so days, I send follow up emails asking why he/the company are so unwilling to refund my monies!
So BEWARE, people, STAY WELL CLEAR OF KEY-MARKETS.COM AND ALL OF ITS PEOPLE!!
Azz
Im having the same issues and was soeaking to the same agent!! Indont think i will be getting my money back.
joe
If you google all of their names they are all fake, using other peoples identities, usually identities belonging to real life high profile traders. They’ve stolen £42k from my father in law. His trades actually paid off and has $98k in his account but they won’t let him take it out without putting more in and this just keeps going on and on. One minute the say hes met all the terms and conditions and then they pass him on to another agent who then changes the terms and conditions. latest agent is Emily Coleman. I’ve spoken to the real Emily Coleman on Twitter and she doesn’t know who this company is. I’ve seen documents that they have sent to my father in law and my experience in financial services tells me these documents are fake, kind of thing you see in phishing emails.
STAY WELL CLEARK OF KEY MARKETS
Patrick A
I have tried to get my money back from key markets. At first, the communication was daily to get me to invest in their BTC contracts (i did not bite) i trade some FX and found it was all the same and wanted to withdraw my money.
What happened then was that i got a call from a totally strange, clearly trying me to expose additional info and feeding my ‘greed’ to get all my losses back. Well, that did not work as I know the risk with investing and there is no way you will get your losses back. So this trying to get me to bite by feeding any greed I had did not work. He called himself Frank M. and the funny part was that he called from the same number as my broker Derek Anderson (or that was the name he used) and when confronting the Frank character with Derek he said he did not know him and I said ‘strange as you are using the same number’.
So the bottom line is i probably will not get the funds back and i will file a proper complain through the CC company to see if there is a change there as the amount is less than 1000 USD so its foreseeable
Andra
Looks like a lot of people has got in their trap, including me as well. They emptied not only my private account but also family account, so total around 10k€. He (Roger Pender) just kept saying that money will be back in next few days and he will trade for me. But it’s already a month and still says me to be patience. He said I have damaged my account while I tried to trade by myself (I just lost what I also got). When I asked him to show in system about my file, he kept sayings it’s not possible and it’s a bureaucracy. First two months money I could see in my trading account, but today, it shows that I own them extra 500$. Even when I sent a application form for withdraw, he cancelled it. When I sent messages in Skype to him, it shows that he has saw it, but no any answers. Two days ago, he got mad at me and asked to act as a adult and not to send 100 messeges, cuz it won’t make things faster.
I thought of using Payback Ltd.. but I guess it’s not also a good idea. When Adam Romanon called from that company (after I sent an email to them), I said after all of this is hard to believe if that’s possible to get back. And I won’t pay anyone any more until money won’t be back in account. While he kept saying “Believe me”. This is just one big stress.
jane
I had Roger Pender as well and now his email is not working anymore do you have the latest one for me? BTW I don’t think it is his real name.
Andra
I hadn’t hear from him since August and not even seen his online status in skype either. In last talks he tried to flirt with me, even sent his photos, about what I doubted and don’t fall for such a things. He was ready to sent money back and more bigger amount cuz it seemed they still used it for trading, but I have to pay 2k Eur as a fee (10% from amount). Of course what I didn’t do. My phone keeps getting calls (till 11 calls per day) from strange numbers from all Europe, so my phone is full with blocked numbers.
Geert Barents
Hi,
Key markets is is scam because I lost 7000 euro.
After talking to a very nice broker we actually made some money like 21000 dollar. After I wanted to cash out 10% everything wend bad, Website down, Email addresses don’t function anymore, Domain name DNS check actually saying that this company no more exist. They work with me via Kraken and bank transfers.
Please don’t believe any word of what they are saying!
Grtz. Geert
roger v
As at 2 July, 2019, I am still chasing this company for return of my investment of £250. I have refused to speak with my so called broker DANIEL GOLDSTEIN, insisting that all contact be via email – no further sweet talk! However, it appears that his email address closed down on 1 July. Despite this, I am not prepared to let this SCAMMING COMPANY get away with things so easily.
I will update in due course.
Анжела
Да это правда это большои лохотрон не ведитесь.я тоже попала .кто то знает ном тел.службу подержки
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Yes, it’s true this is a big scam not fooled. I also got. Someone knows the name of the tel.support service
George Panagiotou
I have opened a Forex account with Key-Markets.net. They have allocated Emily Coleman as my account manager. Since the beginning, Emily Coleman has been putting unduly pressure on me to invest more and more. When I’ve realised that the company is one big scam, I have asked to terminate my account and return the balance owed to me. They then started asking for more money in order to release my funds. This is just a brief summary and the real story is very ugly – and in my opinion, I was also advised by many authorities to that effect, that what Key-Markets are doing is fraudulent and money laundering – in my opinion. 5 July 2019
Ronald van Prehn
In march I deposit $501 and they ask me to deposit $10.000 more and I said are you insane…?
My money stay on my account for 1 month and they were not doing anything with my money….so after a month I ask my money back back and they started to trade without my permission, Lana Woods called me and I said to her don’t trade with my money because I want it back, they did not gave me access to the software and I didn’t gave permission to trade….on a day I was looking at bitcoin revolution and I want to sign up and then I receive a comment welcome back, so that means that I already had an account their which I didn’t know….so I login in and I saw all my trades from Key-Markets and I didn’t gave any permission to trade and Lana Woods promissed me that she was not trading with my money, but she lied and I saw that she lose all my money…and I file a charge back at my bank…and 1 month ago Key -Markets ring me up up and said I am a investigation bureau and this man said if you stop your charge back then I will give you my money back…and of course I didn’t do that because they didn’t contact me me back if I stop the charge back….today 11-07-2019 a lady from Key-Market calls me and she offered me a recovering plan and I had to deposit $250 again and the company gave $250 extra to win my money back in a week….she promissed me to make 800 dollars in a week and then I can withdraw my money…of course I refuse because I had the charge back, it was still going on….if I did it what she offered me then my bank why you call them scammers and you deposit again money to them…..Please people don’t fall in these traps, they just want to steal more money from you….they are 100% scammers…SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM
DO NOT TRADE WITH KEY-MARKETS 100% SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM,SCAM……11-07-2019
Suzanne
Hi, did you ever retireve any of your money? i am in the same situation and they have all my money and have maxed out all my credit cards. They have put me in financial hardship
monte cindy
hoi, bij mij hebben ze na 4 maanden traden ( bracht 8000€ op) zomaar al mijn geld van 3 rekeningen geplunderd! nu hoor ik niks meer van hen, Daniel was zijn naam.
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hi, with me they traded after 4 months (raised 8000 €) just looted all my money from 3 accounts! now I don’t hear from them anymore, Daniel was his name.
Fuck key markets
This is a simple case. Just go to the police and ask for the money back. as they are not a legal broker they cannot practice in your country and as you all are all you are from different countries the police of the various countries will come together.
And even if they close the site. That I think is about to happen. They will be caught. And one more thing nobody lost money on the site because MT4 is always the demo version. You are not playing in the financial markets.
Go to the police and make a complaint take the emails and printrs of all conversations.
now if you do nothing … nothing will happen …
Kevin Williams
Has anybody heard of Michael Bauer?? As I have been promised a return of 30% on my investment of $1000_00
Tet
I work with Michael Bouer. Kan we have contact with each other?
Matthew
I worked with him he lost 55000 usd
Roger V
As at 11 October, I am still emailing Key_Markets.net ( as they are now!)
No nearer getting my modest amount back. As I do not speak but only email, they call almost every day, despite my advising them that all calls are BLOCKED! They cannot or will not send me any documentation to recover my monies – they insist it has to be by phone – NO CHANCE.
It’s so sad that people invest hard earned cash, not for greed, but genuine trading, similar to legitimate Investment companies and the (UK) Stock Markets.
If I don’t get my cash back, it will be a salutary lesson in NOT trusting such SCAMMING, ROBBING COMPANIES, and their SHIEHAWK EMPLOYEES/BROKERS or whatever they call themselves.
ChB
Ich kann nur jedem raten auch Strafanzeige zu erstatten. Nur so können wir den Druck erhöhen, dass strafrechtliche Ermittlungen auf weiteren behördlichen Ebenen durchgeführt werden. Die Vorgehensweise ist bei diesen betrügerischen Handelsgesellschaften, wie bei Key Markets Ltd., immer gleich. Wir unterscheiden uns nur in der Höhe des verlorenen Investments. Wenn wir genügend Betrogene sind, besteht die Möglichkeit, dass wir uns Zivilrechtlich in einer Sammelklage vertreten lassen und somit die Kosten erheblich reduzieren können. Investiert zumindest nochmal 30 Minuten und erstattet Strafanzeige bei der nächsten Polizeidienststelle, Ihr erhöht damit zumindest erheblich die Chancen, dass den Betrügern das Handwerk gelegt wird.
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I can only advise anyone to set the criminal complaint. Only in this way can we increase the pressure for criminal investigations to be carried out at other official levels. The procedure is always the same for these fraudulent trading companies, such as Key Markets Ltd. we differ only in the amount of lost investment. If we are sufficiently enough, there is a possibility that we could take action in a class action lawsuit and thus reduce the costs considerably. Invest at least another 30 minutes and file a criminal complaint at the nearest police station, so you increase at least significantly the chances that the fraudsters could be found.
Elizabeth
Avoid key markets they have ruined my husband’s life robbed him of all his savings and pension and put a rift on our marriage I hope that bitch Emily Coleman if that’s her real name and Jason gillroy again fake and every now and again vincent will appear we will find you and bring you down I hope you rot in hellall of you what you have done to people’s life is shocking if my husband had not kept what he was doing a secret I would have never let him continue we have nothing left so please read this I wouldn’t want any one doing the same boat
Jesper Hansen
New Scam from them:
Dear Trader,
Last year KeyMarkets failed to renew its trading license and regulation due to internal issues. Information was stolen and used to fraudulently take money from customers online.
To ensure this never happens again we are providing you with a security code to ask for when speaking with a representative:6021123.
KeyMarkets have been ordered by the courts of England and Wales to refund every customer to make a deposit with the company with in the last 5 years.
We believe this applies to you, provide a working telephone number so one of our finance representatives can contact you ASAP, ask them to provide your SC, it will then be changed and personalized by the agent representing your case. We are making your safety and security our number one priority.
Reply to this email with:
Your full name
Your working Phone number
How much money you deposited with KeyMarkets
If you do not speak,read or write English please let us know in your native tongue and we will try to accommodate.
We look forward to hearing from you soon.
Best Regards,
image.png
Stephen P. New
VP OF FINANCE &
Solicitor of the Senior Courts of England
and Wales
I did a fake answer, and they keep calling and ask for 20% upfront………….
STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY.
Mike
I like to erase my account speciale my phone number but i dont know how, this crazy people calling me everyday
Dinny
my story is like many above mentioned. I was scammed foor 15k euro’s . At the time I wanted to withdraw my money I was forced to put in extra money ” to release my funds” . Bullshit !
Roger Pender, James Gordon, Paul Gover , I don’t know if these are real names.
But the certainly SCAM you !!