Beware! Fx24trade 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.
It’s hard to believe Fx24trade’s claim to be “one of the most well-established and trusted forex trading brokers” when we’ve never heard of the brand. Fact checking quickly reveals that we are dealing with yet another anonymous website posing as a forex broker in order to scam inexperienced people. Because of this, it would be a serious mistake to trust your money to Fx24trade.
FX24TRADE REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
When you visit the website of a legitimate broker you can expect to find clear and detailed information about the company that owns and operates it, where it is based and what regulatory regimes it is subject to.
This is definitely not the case with Fx24trade. The website and most of the attached legal documents do not mention the name of a legal entity at all. This is completely unacceptable for any legitimate business, let alone a financial services provider. Only in the Risk Warning is the name Fx24trade Limited mentioned.
But we have every reason to believe that no such company exists, and that the address given in Dublin, Ireland, is false. Such a poorly constructed website, lacking basic information, cannot belong to a legitimate broker in a regulated jurisdiction such as the European Union.
As we expected, we did not find any information on “Fx24trade” in the database of the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI), the institution that licenses and supervises brokers in the country.
If you intend to invest in financial instruments, first make sure that the broker you choose is indeed licensed by a solid European regulator such as the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC).
There are many advantages to working with such brokers because they must comply with all the requirements of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ЕSМА). They must maintain a minimum net capital of at least EUR 730 000, which guarantees that the company is financially stable and has a serious long-term approach. When clients deposit money in their trading accounts, they are kept segregated from the broker’s operating funds in separate bank accounts. Thus the clients’ money remains shielded in case of mishaps like a broker’s bankruptcy.
All brokers licensed in Cyprus and other EU countries are members of the Investor Compensation Fund, which may cover a maximum of EUR 20,000 per person in the event of broker insolvency. EU forex brokers are required to report their clients’ transactions on a regular basis. This requirement is designed to improve investor protection and promote market integrity and transparency.
FX24TRADE TRADING SOFTWARE
After registering an account we get access to a rather unconvincing web-based trading platform. Here’s what it looks like:
While the platform has the basic features for placing orders, customizing charts and application of technical indicators, it lacks the more advanced functionality found in the most widely used trading platforms in the industry, MetaTrader 4 (MT4) and MetaTrader 5 (MT5). These platforms have established themselves as industry standard because they offer a wide range of features, including a variety of options for customization, multiple account usage, designing and implementing custom scripts for automated trading and backtesting trade strategies.
It should be noted that the presence of some kind of trading software is no guarantee that it is a genuine broker. Financial scammers often use trading platforms to fool their victims that their money is actually being invested. However, this trading is entirely fictitious and the money goes directly into the scammers’ pockets.
FX24TRADE TRADING CONDITIONS
As well as being unlicensed and lying about being based in Ireland, the Fx24trade claims to offer trading conditions that are not in line with current EU regulations.
Fx24trade claims to offer four types of leveraged trading accounts between 1:100 and 1:400. On the home page we see an even higher value of 1:500 stated.
Regulated brokers do not offer such levels to retail traders as trading with high leverage carries risks of sudden and excessive losses. The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) and accordingly all EU regulators limit leverage to 1:30 for major currency pairs, 1:20 for non-major pairs, gold and major indices, 1:10 for other commodities and non-major indices, and 1:2 for cryptocurrencies.
Fx24trade also promises generous bonuses and promotions – a practice banned by financial regulators not only in the EU but in all other leading markets. Fraudsters often use bonuses to bind their victims to exorbitant conditions. Fx24trade is no exception, as we shall see later.
Fx24trade does not provide any specific information on the other basic parameters of the trade. In the trading platform we see a spread of over 3 pips for the benchmark currency pair EUR/USD. This level is double the industry average and therefore very unprofitable for the trader.
The minimum deposit of 250 EUR. It would be wiser, safer and even cheaper to open a beginner account with a legitimate broker. Many of them allow you to start trading with amounts of 100, 50 USD/EUR or even less.
FX24TRADE DEPOSIT/WITHDRAW METHODS AND FEES
The only way to make a deposit into the FFFF is in cryptocurrencies through the shady provider Shinepays. This method has been used by a number of fake brokers we have encountered, including FX-Trading, CoinsBanking, Elcomercio24 and WinBitX.
Scammers prefer cryptocurrencies because these transactions are not subject to refunds. Legitimate brokers typically offer clients a wide choice of transparent payment methods, including bank transfer, credit/debit cards and established e-wallets such as PayPal, Skrill, or Neteller. If you are interested in licensed brokers that also accept cryptocurrencies as a means of payment, take a look at this list.
Fx24tradedoes not specify that it charges withdrawal fees, but it is clear from the Terms and Conditions that withdrawal may be very difficult or impossible. If the account has received a bonus, it cannot withdraw money from its balance before it has fulfilled the very high minimum trading volume requirement of 30 times the value of the bonus plus the deposit.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORK
Stories of people getting rich from cryptocurrencies tempt many to try their luck in the financial markets. But you have to be very careful not to fall into the clutches of the many scammers lurking in the online space. These scammers only pose as brokers and lure you in with promises to take on the confusing aspects of investing for you.
If you make contact with such scammers they will first convince you to give them a small initial sum of a few hundred dollars. They may even fool you for a while that your investment is generating incredible profits to convince you to give them a larger amount. But your money won’t really be invested. And when you try to withdraw your supposed profits or even your deposit, you will find that it is impossible.
The scammers may tell you that all your investments have been lost by a sudden change in the market. Or they’ll point you to clauses hidden in their Terms and Conditions that say withdrawing your money is only possible after you meet impossibly high minimum trading volume requirements. And they can simply disappear because these scam sites hide behind fake names and offshore companies that are not subject to rules and regulations.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED
If you find yourself a victim of scammers, you should inform the relevant authorities in your country and spread the word online to warn other potential victims. However, the chances of getting your money back are not high.
If you used a credit/debit card for the transactions, you could ask for a chargeback. However, such requests can be disputed if you have provided the fraudsters with proof of identity such as a copy of an ID. Under no circumstances should you trust people on the internet who claim they can recover your money for an upfront fee. These too are certainly scammers.
valle
Hello, I have been scammed by FX24trade. I would like to know how I can recover my money or at least warn others
nikos petridis
Common THUGS who stole from my mother’s pension fund 10.500 euros .STAY AWAY