Beware! Plus5 Trade 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.
The Plus5 Trade website is full of promises of speed, competitiveness, reliability and transparency. But at the same time, we do not find something more important – proof that this is a legitimate forex broker. Closer inspection leaves no doubt that Plus5 Trade is in fact a scam. In this review, we will look in detail at the reasons why it is in your best interest to stay away from Plus5 Trade.
PLUS5 TRADE REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
If a financial services provider is legitimate, you will find on its website clear and detailed information about the company that owns and operates it, where it is based, and what licences it has. Genuine brokers also provide access to a comprehensive set of legal documentation.
The availability of such information does not guarantee that it is not false or misleading. But the absence of these elements is very indicative that in all likelihood you are dealing with scammers.
Plus5 Trade is completely anonymous. No company name or address is given anywhere.
When registering an account, agreement to the Terms and Conditions is required, but the link to the supposed document is blank. If you do not know who you are dealing with and what terms you are agreeing to, it would be extremely unwise to put your money on the line.
If you intend to invest in financial instruments, you should beware of the many fake brokers lurking online. Always check carefully whether the broker you choose really has the necessary licences.
There are numerous benefits to working with a company that is truly authorised and supervised by a regulatory institution such as the 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.
PLUS5 TRADE TRADING SOFTWARE
After registering an account and logging in to the Plus5 Trade dashboard, we get access to a simple web-based trading platform. Here is how it looks like:
These are not the powerful trading tools that are promised in the homepage of the website.
While the platform has the basic features for placing orders, customising 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 a trading platform does not make this website any more legitimate and does not guarantee that this alleged broker offers real trading. Many scammers use rigged trading software to fool their victims that their money is being invested.
PLUS5 TRADE TRADING CONDITIONS
Another thing that is completely missing from the Plus5 Trade website is information about the terms of trade that are supposedly offered.
Legitimate forex brokers offer a variety of trading account types tailored to the needs of clients with different capital and investment intentions. These brokers also provide clear and detailed information on trading parameters – leverage, spread, commissions, order execution method, etc.
Many of the leading companies in the industry allow you to open a starter account with a very low minimum deposit of 100 USD or even less.
In the trading platform we see a spread of about 1 pip. In theory this is a competitive level, but as noted, we have no reason to believe that Plus5 Trade offers any real trading.
A leverage level of 1:100 is set in the platform. This is not a level that you see with regulated 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.
Regulated brokers offer higher leverage only to professional clients who must meet very high standards for capital and experience and forgo the guarantees enjoyed by retail traders.
If you don’t qualify as a professional trader but are willing to take the risk of high-leverage trading, the most viable option is to use the services of an offshore affiliate of an established brand.
PLUS5 TRADE DEPOSIT/WITHDRAW METHODS AND FEES
As expected, Plus5 Trade only allows the deposit of funds via cryptocurrencies, although a variety of payment methods are advertised on the website.
This is typical of financial scammers. Cryptocurrencies are their payment method of choice because on the one hand they allow the scammer a degree of anonymity, and on the other hand they do not allow the scammed to ask for a refund.
While there are some legitimate brokers that accept digital currencies like Bitcoin, they do so alongside other transparent payment methods such as credit/debit card, bank transfer or popular e-wallets like PayPal, Sofort or Skrill.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORKS
The hype surrounding cryptocurrencies has drawn public attention to the trading of financial instruments. However, the vast majority of people remain ignorant about financial markets. There are a growing number of scammers who are taking advantage of this by posing as brokers.
If you make contact with any of these sites that promise to make you rich effortlessly, they will first start convincing you to make a small “investment” of a few hundred dollars. If you prove susceptible, even more convincing scam artists will court you to give them even more money. They will probably even fool you into thinking that your initial investment has already generated profits.
But the truth is that your money will never be truly invested. It will go straight into the pockets of the crooks and you will probably never see it again. Scammers hide behind fake and offshore companies that are not subject to any regulation and control. They also often use non-transparent payment methods that make it difficult to track them and recover money. Your attempts to withdraw your supposed profits or deposit will be blocked by confusing clauses in the Terms and Conditions, prohibitively high volume requirements and huge withdrawal fees.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED
Unfortunately, it is difficult to recover money given to such scammers. If credit or debit cards were used for the transfer, there is a chance if you ask for a chargeback. Visa and MasterCard allow this to be done within 540 days. But this method is not foolproof either, because fraudsters will ask you for copies of your ID and proof of address right from the start. This way they can claim to the card company that the transfer was voluntary and agreed by both parties.
It is important not to trust offers from people on the internet to recover your money from scammers for a fee. Such offers also come from scammers.
