The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) today issued a warning about a Clone firm called Efforex, which has been posing as LMAX Exchange, a London-based and FCA regulated multilateral trading facility (MTF).
The FCA said this bogus entity has no association whatsoever with the UK registered company LMAX. It added that scammers are falsely claiming the name, address and company number of the UK registered company.
Fraudsters have cloned legitimate investment firm LMAX to lure consumers into fake products. The copycat firm, which has no registered address, is selling trading products to institutional and professional traders by copying the regulatory details of a licensed business.
Clone firms operate by mimicking legitimate company details to scam people into fake, non-tradable or worthless investments. Investors can protect themselves by being wary of any cold calls offering investment opportunities and being sure the check the company’s details on the FCA register.
The FCA warnings included contact details for each of the firms included and stressed that almost all companies who offer, promote or sell financial services or products in the UK have to be authorized by the regulator.
The real business, LMAX Exchange, has a legitimate company registration number and is based in Yellow Building, Nicholas Road, London.
The FCA has continued its ongoing efforts to alert the public against fraudulent and unauthorized entities. Investors can easily fall victim to entities which use a name that is similar to an authorized and licensed company, to fool the potential victim into thinking that the company is under the monitoring and regulatory restrictions of the FCA.
The FCA encourages traders or those considering Online Trading to exercise caution, strongly advising against funding an account or investing via this specific company. Anyone who chooses to sign up with the impostor should bear in mind that they will not receive the financial authorities’ assistance should things go awry.
