Beware! Wizard Capitals 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.
Wizard Capitals claims to be a forex broker that has established itself as a “global brand” thanks to its superior customer service. We find a lot wrong with this claim, not the least of which is that this brand is globally unknown. At the time of writing this review, Wizard Capitals lacks even the basic functionality needed to offer the financial services it claims. Most importantly, Wizard Capitals does not have the necessary licenses. We therefore advise you to stay away from this website.
WIZARD CAPITALS REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
On the homepage of the website we see a claim that the owner of this alleged broker, Wizard Capitals Ltd, is regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) of St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG).
This statement is misleading. The SVG is an offshore zone where there are no regulations in place for brokers. Therefore, registration there provides no guarantees for Wizard Capitals clients. The FSA specifically warns that it does not license forex brokers or supervise the activities of International Business Companies engaged in such activities.
Wizard Capitals also does not have Terms and Conditions or any other legal documentation. This is one of the clues that Wizard Capitals is actually a scam and not just an offshore broker. It would be an unjustifiable mistake to trust your money to an unregulated company that hides what the terms of the deal are.
You should only trust legitimate brokers operating in one of the established financial centres like the UK, EU, USA or Australia. There, the activities of brokers are controlled by powerful regulatory bodies such as UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC), Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in US or Australian Securities and Exchanges Commission (ASIC). Clients of these brokers receive protections such as negative balance protection and segregation of the client’s funds from the broker’s funds.
In the EU and the UK, brokers must also participate in guarantee schemes that cover a certain amount of the trader’s investment if the broker becomes insolvent. These guarantees amount to up to 20 000 EUR in the EU and 85 000 GBP in the UK. However, the likelihood of such a bankruptcy is low because regulators also have significant net capital requirements that companies must maintain – EUR 730 000 in UK and Cyprus, AUD 1000 000 in Australia and at least 20 million USD in the United States.
WIZARD CAPITALS TRADING SOFTWARE
On the website we see promises of not one, but four trading platforms. After registering an account, we get access to supposed download links for various versions of MetaTrader 5 (MT5) – currently the most popular software among brokers worldwide. But none of these links work. Wizard Capitals doesn’t actually have the most important tool for forex trading.
You could always use the services of a regulated broker, the vast majority of which offer clients MT5 or the still very popular MT4. This will enable you to use the advanced features of these platforms without fear of being scammed. These platforms are preferred by the majority of brokers around the world because of their powerful automated trading capabilities, including Expert Advisor bots and customized scripts for backtesting trading strategies.
WIZARD CAPITALS TRADING CONDITIONS
Wizard Capitals claims to offer trading in all major asset classes. As we have seen, they have neither the legal authorization nor the technological capacity for this to be true. On the website, we find a description of three types of trading accounts, which lacks the detailed information on trading conditions that real brokers offer.
Wizard Capitals offer leverage of up to 1:1000 – a level that is high even by the standards of offshore brokers. Trading with high leverage allows higher profits, but also increases the risk of sudden and excessive losses proportionally. All leading regulators limit leverage for retail traders. In the EU, UK and Australia the maximum permitted level is 1:30 and in the US it is 1:50. This maximum level only applies to trading major currency pairs, with even more limited leverage for more volatile assets.
On the website we see two different versions of the minimum deposit amount – 200 USD and 1000 USD. In any case, it would be a better choice to use the services of a licensed broker. Many leading brands in the industry allow you to start trading with amounts of and below 100 USD.
Wizard Capitals promises a fairly standard trading price – 1.2 pips or a raw spread with a commission of 7/8 USD per lot. But these values have no real meaning since Wizard Capitals doesn’t even have trading software.
WIZARD CAPITALS DEPOSIT/WITHDRAW METHODS AND FEES
As in all other aspects, the Wizard Capitals does not offer information on available payment methods, nor does it have a functioning deposit menu. Legitimate brokers typically offer clients a wide choice of transparent payment methods, including bank transfer, credit/debit cards and established e-wallets such as Sofort, GiroPay, Skrill or Neteller.
The lack of a publicly available Terms and Conditions or Client Agreement means that scammers may have set many traps such as hidden fees and impossible-to-meet withdrawal terms.
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.
