Beware! VTindex 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.
In the following review, we will try to explain why depositing with a broker like VTindex is an incredibly bad idea. This is not a company you should put your trust in – they are an offshore broker who lies about being regulated and whose website malfunctioned on every step of the way. Avoid such enterprises at all costs.
VTindex REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
VTindex supposedly has offices in the UK, UAE, Malaysia, St.Vincent and the Grenadines, and Hong Kong – but they have only provided actual contact information and address for their St.Vincent and the Grenadines branch. This country is a favorite location for scammers. The local financial regulator does not monitor the activities of forex brokers and does not impose any laws and requirements. All a broker has to do to start offering services is set up a company – something that is very easy to do.
The broker claimed to be regulated by strict authorities such as the FCA (UK), KNF (Poland), and CMB (Turkey) – but that turned out to be a lie.
This means that we are dealing with an unlicensed offshore broker that is willing to lie about being regulated. Such brokers cannot guarantee reliability or any sort of protection – investing with them would mean taking a huge risk.
Working with a broker licensed in the UK, the EU, and Australia is a much safer affair because it provides access to countless protections and means that you can rely on a certain degree of safety and transparency. Such brokers maintain a high standard of service and are obligated to follow many laws and procedures. For example, all such brokers have to maintain a minimum capital of €730 000 in the UK and the EU, and A$1 million in Australia – this is done because brokers should prove that they are financially stable and would be able to survive in volatile market conditions. Client funds are always kept separate from the broker’s own – this is done to ensure that client money and broker money cannot mix and that if the broker goes bankrupt your money would still be safe in a separate account. Negative balance protection is provided – this basically means that the losses you can suffer as a retail trader can never exceed the amount of capital you have in your account.
VTindex TRADING SOFTWARE
VTindex promised access to MetaTrader 4 – one of the most famous and beloved platforms in the trading industry. However, downloading the platform from the broker’s website or even getting information about it turned out to be impossible – the page devoted to MT4 did not load. We were also unable to open an account with VTindex and access some sort of client area – we managed to fill a registration form but after that, we got a message that something had gone wrong. As a result, we cannot confirm that this broker offers MT4 – or any other functional trading platform.
We would suggest that you take a look at these legitimate brokers who offer MT4 – there is a reason why this has been one of the most popular platforms in the world of trading for decades. This is a robust platform that is quite intuitive and beginner-friendly and offers a variety of useful trading tools. Clients would be able to get access to features such as Expert Advisors that track markets and trade automatically, VPSs, a Strategy Tester, a market where you could purchase different add-ons as well as a variety of technical indicators, timeframes, order execution types, and pending order types.
VTindex TRADING CONDITIONS
VTindex offers three different account types but other than the maximum possible leverage, there is not much of a difference between these account types. The minimum deposit amount is the same in all cases – $500. That is actually way too much for an initial deposit – many great brokers would open an account for anywhere between $1 and $100.
Without an account, we cannot be sure that the maximum leverage rates promised are anywhere close to reality – we cannot be sure that leverage trading is possible at all. However, we would still like to point out that the rates the broker promised – between 1:100 and 1:300 depending on your account – are quite high. Trading with high leverage could indeed lead to decent profits – but it could also result in big losses if you do not have the knowledge and experience to handle it yet. Moreover, such high leverage is banned in the UK where this broker claims to be licensed. The maximum leverage UK, EU, and Australian brokers can offer to retail traders is much lower – 1:30 on forex majors.
VTindex DEPOSIT AND WITHDRAWAL METHODS AND FEES
Since we were not able to open an account with VTindex, we were also unable to deposit or even see which deposit methods were available. The broker stated on the website that it does not charge deposit fees and that it accepts more than 10 payment methods including WebMoney – but there is no proof of that.
Our suggestion is to not deposit with fraudulent brokers in the first place because you will just be left wondering how to get your money back. Moreover, many such brokers prefer irreversible crypto payments which means you might not even be able to retrieve your payments in some cases.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORK?
This type of scam is really not that complicated – but it has proven to be quite effective and has managed to trick quite a few people. Given such schemes’ growing popularity, it is important to know how to avoid them – so reading the following paragraphs carefully is vital.
The scam starts with you seeing an ad on the Internet for a certain broker’s website. Such websites usually promise amazing conditions and extremely fast profits – but offer very little in terms of license and company information. However, sometimes scammers can be very elaborate in their promise – so you fall for it and provide them with a phone number or an email. There is another option – they might have stumbled upon your contact details somewhere and are the first to make contact. After that, a game of cat and mouse begins – you will be asked to open an account and make a deposit. Keep in mind that these are professional scammers who convince people to transfer money for a living – they will sweet-talk you into depositing by talking about profits and opportunities.
After that, you might indeed see profits and deposit even more money – but all of this is smoke and mirrors, scammers often manipulate results to make you transfer bigger amounts.
At some point, of course, you would want to withdraw your money – and the problems will start. Additional fees or unfulfilled clauses in the Terms and Conditions will appear, and you will be denied access to your money. At this point, you will probably discover something is wrong – and this is when the scammers will drop out of sight.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED?
There are a few things you could do if you discover you have been scammed. Chargebacks are possible in some cases depending on the payment method you have used to deposit. Both Visa and MasterCard allow such chargebacks within 540 days while bank transfers and cryptocurrency transactions are irreversible.
Make sure to change all banking passwords. If you have installed any remote access software, remove it immediately – scammers ask their victims to install such software under different pretexts but their endgame is to just get access to your banking accounts and steal even more money.
Notify authorities and share your story with as many people as possible – the more people know about such scams, the less they will fall victim to fraudulent schemes.
Last but not least – don’t trust any so-called “recovery agents” that offer to retrieve your money for a fee – this is just another type of scam, sometimes even conducted by the same people that stole your money in the first place.
