Beware! Meliorate Limited 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.
Meliorate Limited did not manage to compel us to start trading with them. There were so many problems with this broker that we do not know where to start. From the lack of a license and the offer of dangerous trading tools to the absence of decent legal documentation, this seems to be a scam through and through. Avoid the broker if you want to trade safely!
Meliorate Limited REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
Meliorate Limited claims to be based in London, UK. However, they were certainly not regulated by the UK financial regulatory body, the FCA.
This means that the broker offers services without proper authorization. Not only that but they seemed to offer conditions that no UK broker could legally offer – like extremely high leverage. Meliorate Limited claimed to be “a unique binary options trading platform” – and binary options are a tool that has been banned almost everywhere around the world, including the UK. This is obviously not a legitimate company – opening an account with such a shady enterprise would put you at risk.
Only work with reliable, licensed brokers – this is the only way to actually stay safe while trading. Turning to a broker licensed in a strict jurisdiction such as the UK, the EU, or Australia would grant you access to many protections and would mean that your broker has to conduct business with consideration to many laws and procedures. All licensed brokers have to keep client money in segregated bank accounts managed by third parties – this ensures that your funds would not mix with those of the broker, and would not be used for any of the broker’s own financial operations. It also means that you would not lose your deposits if the broker goes bankrupt. However, this is not that likely – such brokers are obligated to prove their financial stability by maintaining a certain minimum capital. The number is €730 000 in the UK and the EU, and A$1 million in Australia but could potentially go higher for brokers with many clients. Negative balance protection is also a vital safety net – no retail trader could lose more money than they have in their account.
Meliorate Limited TRADING SOFTWARE
Meliorate Limited offers access to a quite standard web-based trading platform:
Such platforms are hardly the most outstanding software you could get access to. They are not bad by any means – they just offer a level of functionality that is a bit too limited, even for beginner traders. Such a platform is definitely not reason enough for you to open an account with a scam broker.
Our advice is to check out a more advanced trading solution such as the well-known MetaTrader 5. This beloved platform is one of the most popular in the world of trading – it is both user-friendly and highly functional. MT5 offers a huge number of indicators, timeframes, and order execution types but also some nice additional features – Expert Advisors that track markets and trade automatically, VPSs you could purchase to keep those EAs operating even when your computer is off, the chance to create custom indicators and trading bots, or to set signals for prices going up or down, a community chat, a multi-threaded Strategy Tester, a built-in economic calendar, and much more.
Meliorate Limited TRADING CONDITIONS
Meliorate Limited seems to offer good trading conditions at first glance. The spread we got on the broker’s platform was around 0.6 pips on EURUSD which is much lower than the industry average of 1.5 pips. However, the broker has not explicitly stated that it does not charge additional commissions. Platform manipulations are also not unheard of in the world of scam brokers. With such shady enterprises, you just never know what will turn out to be a problem at some point.
The maximum leverage you could trade with was 1:200 on forex majors. This is just another proof that this could not be a legitimate UK broker. In the UK, as well as in many other strict jurisdictions, leverage caps exist. Retail clients are not allowed to trade with leverage higher than 1:30 on forex majors. The reason for these restrictions is that trading with high leverage is risky – it could result in either bigger profits, or bigger, faster losses. For inexperienced traders, losing is a much more likely scenario. Be careful when it comes to leverage and only choose brokers that can offer high rates legally.
The minimum deposit Meliorate Limited asks for is quite low – €100. However, since this is not a legitimate broker, we would not advise you to deposit with them under any circumstances. Open an account with one of these affordable brokers instead.
Meliorate Limited DEPOSIT AND WITHDRAWAL METHODS AND FEES
Even though we technically deposited with Meliorate Limited, we still have no idea which deposit methods they actually accepted. When we tried to deposit, the broker just informed us that our payment had gone through even though we had not provided any sort of payment information or chosen a payment method. On its website, Meliorate Limited claims that you can “use your Visa, Mastercard, CashU or Wire transfer to place direct deposits”. The broker went on to add that you could also deposit via QIWI or in crypto. There are supposedly no deposit and withdrawal fees. We cannot, however, confirm that any of these claims are true.
Our advice is not to deposit with such shady brokers at all – you will be running the risk of getting scammed.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORK?
In recent years, such scams have become more frequent than you can imagine. That is why it is very important to learn how they usually work and how to tell scam brokers apart from legitimate ones.
Always make sure to check the registers of regulatory bodies to make sure that a broker is licensed and reliable. Stay away from shady-looking websites that promise enormous profits in no time with zero effort. Do your own research – never blindly trust what a certain broker is telling you.
All scams start in a fairly similar way. You see an ad on the Internet promising immense fortune in no time – the only thing you have to do is open an account with a particular forex broker. You give in to curiosity and provide the scammers with your phone number and e-mail – at this point, you might still be reluctant to deposit. But once the scammers have your contact information, you will start getting calls and messages from them. They will ask you to deposit to unlock the full potential of their platforms and turn a profit. Keep in mind that such people are well-versed in the art of sweet-talking – they can promise amazing things and make effortless profits seem possible.
After you make an initial deposit, they would not leave you alone and keep asking for more money. You might even be happy to deposit since, at this point, it might seem like you are turning a profit. Scammers tend to manipulate platforms and results to make it look like you are doing great when you are actually just pouring money into their schemes.
The moment you try to withdraw, you will find out that something is not quite right. Reasons why withdrawals are impossible will show up – additional taxes, new clauses in the broker’s Terms and Conditions, etc. At some point, you will figure out that you are being scammed – but it would already be too late. The scammers will stop answering your calls and e-mails – and they will simply disappear with all your deposits.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED?
The first thing you should do is contact your bank and inform them about what has happened. Change your banking passwords to ensure that the scammers would have no way of stealing more money.
If you have installed remote access software – such as TeamViewer or AnyTesk – make sure to remove it. Some scam brokers will try to convince you that such software is necessary for a better trading experience – in order for them to help you with platform issues, or even with trading. Their true goal is to get access to your computer and banking systems – so they can start draining your accounts.
If you have deposited with a credit or debit card, make sure to contact your card issuer as soon as possible. Both Visa and MasterCard try to combat scams by allowing chargebacks within 540 days of the transactions. Retrieving your money might still be possible. If you have deposited in crypto, on the other hand, there would, unfortunately, be no way for you to get your money back.
Make sure to inform the authorities in your country about the broker and share your story – online and with acquaintances. This will prevent people from getting scammed in the same way.
One final important note – never trust anyone that calls themselves a “recovery agent”. Such “agents” promise to track down the scammers and retrieve your money – for a fee, of course. This is nothing more but another type of scam directed at desperate people.
