SEC Fines, Bans Binary Options Scammers

The US Securities and Exchange Commission or SEC charged a German and two Israeli nationals for selling over US$100-million worth of binary options contracts. The securities market regulator facilitated the case, in which a California district court entered into a final judgment last week against the three binary options scheme operators that defrauded retail investors based in the United States and overseas.

We want to share this report with our readers interested in engaging with binary options trading and those who are existing traders. In addition, we want to warn them that fraudsters are still rampant nowadays, though the SEC works hard to penalize these scammers.

According to the report posted online by multi-asset digital trading information source, Finance Magnates, Raz Beserglik, Gil Beserglik, and Kai Christian Petersen ran the operations of the binary options scheme. They neither denied nor admitted the accusations that the SEC brought against them.

However, the three accused consented to the final judgments’ entry. The Besergliks and Petersen’s binary options firm operated between 2014 and 2017.

Additionally, they reportedly worked from boiler rooms based in Israel and Germany. The binary options fraud perpetrators reportedly lured thousands of American and foreign investors into risky investments, duping them with millions of US dollars by selling binary options contracts via three affiliated brands: Starling Capital, Morton Finance, and Bloombex Options.

The official complaint detailed that Petersen and the Besergliks utilized high-pressure sales tactics in selling and offering questionable and speculative binary options to their unwitting retail investors.

Furthermore, the operators’ employees reportedly lied to their investors regarding their trading expertise and identities, trapping their victims into high-risk investments. These staff members of the Besergliks and Petersen’s binary options scheme even approached unsuspecting retail investors, remarking that the broker merely makes money if the investor makes money.

The SEC discovered that, in reality, the binary options operators only earn funds at the investors’ loss. As a result, the Besergliks and Petersen were charged for trapping United States-based investors without any proper authorization as a dealer or broker from the SEC.

They further agreed to settle the heavy penalties and disgorgements. Raz is paying US$465,000 in penalties and US$2,086,421 in disgorgement. Petersen agreed to settle US$200,296 in disgorgement and another US$100,000 in a civil penalty.

Finally, Gil will pay US$300,000 as a penalty and more than US$2.3 million as disgorgement. Furthermore, the court has banned them from offering and selling securities-based swaps, other securities, and binary options over the Internet.

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