Beware! Baazex is an offshore broker! Your investment may be at risk.
RECOMMENDED FOREX BROKERS
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Open trading accounts with at least two brokers.
Baazex offers a variety of trading instruments with 3 account types, leverage as high as 1000:1 and the MetaTrader5 platform.
There are some 50 forex pairs in the list of trading instruments, lots of which minor or exotic like USDZAR, USDTRY, USDSEK, USDSGD, USDPLN, USDNOK, USDMXN. USDHUF, USDDKK, USDCZK and USDCNH, as well as CFDs on gold, silver, oil, natural gas, cocoa, coffee, cotton, sugar, 14 indices, Bitcoin, Dash, Ethereum, Litecoin and Ripple.
And spreads start form about 1,8 pips – which is slightly higher for our taste.
The higher spreads, however are not the main issue with Baazex, but the fact that they are not licensed to operate on regulated markets like the European Union, the U.S., Australia, Canada or Japan.
Baazex regulation & safety of funds
We understand that Baazex is owned and operated by Baazex International Limited, which is incorporated in St. Vincent and the Grenadine – a popular offshore destination in the West Indies.
And as we already noted Baazex does not have a legit forex license as the local Financial Services Authority (FSA) on St. Vincent and the Grenadines simply does not regulate forex and CFD brokers.
By the way FSA has even issued an official warning, published on its website, as a response to the numerous scam brokers, which falsely claim to be regulated by the institution.
Bear in mind that trading with unregulated brokers like Baazex is extremely risky, as they are completely unaccountable for the way they handle your money.
On the other hand you will be completely safe with a broker, regulated by a well known financial watchdog like the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK, the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) or the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).
Baazex deposit/withdrawal methods and fees
Baazex says to accept payments with Bitcoins, VISA, MasterCard, bank wire, Skrill and Neteller, but we were not able to verify this.
You should be ware as well that Baazex offers a variety of trading bonuses like the “Lucky100”, “$50 welcome bonus” and the “20% Deposit Bonus”, which although attractive on first glance come with strings attached.
The practice of offering trading bonuses is highly controversial and it was not a surprise, when trading bonuses were altogether banned in Europe and on many other regulated markets.
The main problem with all trading bonuses is that too often they are used by scammers as an excuse to cancel your withdraw requests.
Otherwise the minimum deposit requirement of just 10 USD seems fine.
How does the scam work?
By clicking on an ad on the social networks or just somewhere on the internet you may happen to land on one of the so called robo scam websites like Bitcoin Profit and Brexit Trader. We call them robo scam websites, because they are totally anonymous and basically function as automatic portals that trap victims for scam brokers in exchange of a commission. So if you come across one of those websites you will be greeted by some nicely cut video ad, that will promise, fast, easy and completely risk free returns in exchange of a tiny investment.
And if you get hooked and register, in a second you will be transferred to the web page of unregulated scam broker, where finally you will have to deposit your first 250 USD.
And take a note that your first trades might look amazingly successful and in no time the money in your account will seem to have doubled. That however will be just part of the trap. Scammers simply want to lure you to invest a larger amount. And it is exactly what your “senior account manager” we tell you on the phone as well – if you really want to make some big money you will definitely have to invest more. Like at least 10 000 USD.
And many people do invest that kind of money without realizing they have been scammed until the very moment they decide to withdraw some of their funds. Than all of a sudden it turns out they can not withdraw because of some minimum trade volume requirement, possibly liked to a trading bonus they have accepted. The excuse might certainly be different, but the end result will always be the same – if you have been scammed, you will not be able to withdraw a single dollar.
What to do if scammed?
There is only one way that you might recover your deposit and that is to file for a charge back with your credit card provider. Fortunately both VISA and MasterCard now allow their client to file for a charge back within 540 days.
Also, if for some reason you have told scammers your personal banking details like credit card numbers, or online banking password, immediately change the password and block your credit cards. Also, if scammers have tricked you to install Team Viewer – delete the program immediately.
And do not trust the so called recovery agencies. Those guys will not help you in any way, but will simply ask for an upfront payment and that is basically how the story will end.
Thomas
Very bad Experience with baaazex