The Financial Conduct Authority (Photo: Bloomberg)
The U.K. financial regulator has been busy warning the public about the services of a duo of companies which are not regulated and do not have the permission to collect clients from the E.U. In addition, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has warned the public against dealing with a clone company named Tradignition, which provides binary options services.
The entity behind the latter firm claims to be in partnership with FCA regulated publicly- traded broker, London Capital Group Holdings. Sales representatives of Tradignition have been telling clients that the company was in a partnership with the FCA licensed firm, LCG Capital.
Prospective customers of the firm were being informed that it was a regulated entity with Regulation information of London Capital Gorup Holdings being sent out to the clients for reassurance.
This fraudulent practice is commonly known as a “clone firm”. The unregulated entity under the name SkyOPtions, which is behind Tradignition, claims to be located in London, however, when contacted by Forex Magnates' reporters on the support phone on the website, the person representing the company shared in very poor English that the firm was not located in the U.K.
The representative denied to comment on the FCA warning against the firm.
In separate announcements, a couple of brokerages have been highlighted by the FCA as potential risks for clients from the U.K. Both GMT Markets and BlackBird Clear Limited have not been regulated by the FCA.
The U.K. watchdog has expressed its concerns that GMT Markets is actively soliciting clients from the region without being regulated in any E.U. country. The brokerage does not claim to be a regulated entity on its website.
In contrast, BlackBird Clear Limited has been claiming on its website that it is regulated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA), which is the former name of the U.K. financial regulatory agency. The duties of the FSA have been split between the Bank of England and the FCA since 2013.
