Beware! CryptoLiquidityX 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.
CryptoLiquidityX claims to be a well-established, award-winning broker with branches all over the world, which offers trading in currency pairs, stocks, indices, commodities and digital currencies. However, this is a very shady and unregulated platform whose obvious purpose is to cheat people out of their money.
CRYPTOLIQUIDITYX REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
On its website, CryptoLiquidityX states that it is a company headquartered in Switzerland and 7 branches in Honk Kong, Dubai, Qatar, Berlin, Johannesburg, Shanghai, Honk Kong being the largest one. However, the Terms and Conditions state that “users accessing this site are required to inform themselves about the jurisdiction restrictions of Estonian Governing law”.
A check shows that no company under the name CryptoLiquidityX is among those authorised by the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA). The same result came from the registers of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin). There is no broker with such a name among those licensed by the Estonian Financial Supervision Authority.
This shows that CryptoLiquidityX are shamelessly lying about their location and the nature of their activity. This is not a licensed broker subject to regulation, and your money would not be safe at all.
Such sites should be avoided at all costs. Instead, you can approach one of the many legitimate brokers operating under the supervision of respected regulatory bodies such as Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) or Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK. As their customer you will enjoy a number of guarantees including negative balance protection and guarantee for your funds if the broker goes bankrupt, which goes up to EUR 20,000 in EU and 85,000 GBP in the UK.
CRYPTOLIQUIDITYX TRADING SOFTWARE
One of the many bold claims made on the CryptoLiquidityX’s website is that their trading platform has been distinguished as a “Best Platform for Speed and Security” and “Best Web-based Trading App”. In fact, it is a standard Webtrader. When the application is opened a message pops up that it is not actually licensed for that domain:
Although this platform in principle has all the basic functionalities, most of them are inactive due to the lack of a license. Here’s what the platform looks like:
Legitimate brokers offer their clients a wide selection of quality software solutions, which most often include the most popular platforms in the industry MetaTrader 4 (MT4) and MetaTrader 5 (MT5). These platforms offer much more diverse options for customization and automated trading, including the use of Expert Advisor bots.
CRYPTOLIQUIDITYX TRADING CONDITIONS
CryptoLiquidityX offers three types of accounts – Standard, Premium and Luxury, with the lowest minimum deposit being EUR 250. Legitimate brokers usually offer more favorable terms for beginner traders, including micro accounts with a minimum deposit of 100 EUR/USD.
The leverage offered ranges from 1:80 to 1:500 for the different accounts. In the client portal and trading platform, leverage is set at 1:100. This is another indicator that this may not be a legitimate broker operating in the European Union. The Еuropean Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) rules limit leverage to 1:30 for major currency pairs and to even lower levels for more volatile assets for retail traders. While high leverage allows for high profits, the associated risk is deemed too great.
In the trading platform, it can also be seen that the spread is set at around 3 pips. In the industry, levels above 2 pips are considered high and unfavorable for the trader.
CryptoLiquidityX also offers customers bonuses and promotions, which has long been disallowed not only by regulators in the EU, but also those in the UK and the US
CRYPTOLIQUIDITYX DEPOSIT/WITHDRAW METHODS AND FEES
The logos of well-known payment services such as Visa, MasterCard and Maestro can be seen on the CryptoLiquidityX’s website. The text of the Terms and Conditions also includes standard wording for bank and card transfers or electronic payments, including a minimum withdrawal amount for wire transfers of 250 USD/GBP/EUR.
However, the only active option for depositing money is Bitcoin. So any conditions for withdrawing money by card or bank, listed in CryptoLiquidityX’s website, don’t actually apply.
While Bitcoin and other currencies have legitimate uses, they are often used by fraudsters because, unlike card transfers, they are not subject to refunds. Here you can see a list of legitimate brokers that accept Bitcoin payments.
CryptoLiquidityX’s Terms and Conditions also state that all funds that are not directly deposited by the client, including profits gained on account, are not considered client’s funds and are not available for immediate withdrawal. CryptoLiquidityX reserves the full right “to reclaim any and all such funds”.
The withdrawal of the bonuses granted to the customer is subject to a minimum trading volume. In one place on the site this volume is defined as 25 times the deposit plus the bonus issued, and on another – 30 times.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORK
Scammers who promise easy money without any effort are nothing new, especially on the internet. But given the excitement around bitcoin and cryptocurrencies in recent years, malicious actors have run rampant more than ever, capitalizing not only on people’s desire to solve their financial woes with a magic wand, but also ignorance and misunderstanding of how blockchain and complex financial instruments actually work.
If your curiosity is stirred by one of the many flashy websites promising easy riches, and you provide your contacts, you will soon be contacted by skillful and persuasive scammers who will convince you to start with a relatively small and “risk-free” investment. If you agree to this, you will be transferred to even more skilled at convincing scammers, who will persuade you to invest even more. Any money you give to such people is money you are unlikely to get back.
Any attempt to withdraw deposits or alleged profits will be hampered by numerous and significant fees, as well as harsh and often prohibitive conditions written into the terms and conditions – such as high trading volume requirements, unexpected “taxes”, or withdrawal fees as high as 10% or even 20% of your funds.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED
Recovering money you have given to fraudsters is difficult and often impossible. Fraudsters always want you to provide them with documents such as a copy of your ID and proof of address so that they can claim that it is a legitimate transaction, agreed voluntarily between both parties. If the transaction is made by credit or debit card, you can request a cashback and hope for the best, but transactions via wire transfer or cryptocurrencies are not refundable. It is important not to trust online offers from people who offer to recover your money in exchange for an upfront payment, because this is also a well-known scam.
