LXK Inc / Wellington Capital Group Scam.
In June 2019 we issued a Scam Alert about LXK Inc and Wellington Capital Group. You can read that original article here – LINK. This is a scam which was primarily focused on investors resident in Asia, but as with all scams the global reach of the internet allows scammers to attract investors from around the world.
That article was written almost three years ago. To bring things up to date, investors who are trying to recover their money have begun to receive details of a classic follow-on-fraud scam designed to squeeze more money from the victims. This follow-on-fraud is attempting to convince investors that the Bank Of China has come to their rescue and has agreed to buy up all investors’ shares in LXK Inc. As with every follow-on-fraud the victims’ funds can only be released if a fee is paid. That’s the scam.
We have copied their introductory email below:
From: Bank of China <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: LXK Shares
Date:
To:
Cc: Bank of China <[email protected]>
Dear
We appreciate the inquiry and response to the LXK Inc. class action notice and I will outline Bank of China’s role in this transaction.
Bank of China was not a participant in the negotiated settlement in fact before we were contracted to facilitate the settlement, we had little knowledge of LXK was or the history of the company, so we did our due diligence before we accepted the appointment by the CSRC to contact all the shareholders and execute the forms and distribute the funds.
I have attached the CSRC official document outlining the lawsuit and settlement particulars as well as a road map as to the distribution of assets and those assigned to facilitate the settlement.
I have attached all the closing documents package needed for settlement and transfer, the documents include and invoice, designated banking form, and the bank details for required fees for settlement.
I have also included a Letter of Intent/Proof of Funds from Bank of China Corporate the designated holding account that will distribute the funds to Bank of China International Holdings Ltd for distribution,
As stated on the invoice attached, we will be collecting $XXXXXXX USD in Escrow Transaction Fee (ETF), that consist of Legal, Escrow and Administration Fee’s, these fees are required and will be remitted to JP Morgan Chase Bank N.A./BOC LTD Holdings Inc. to be monitored and administered by the regulator (CSRC) as to not only have an orderly transaction but to discourage any malfeasance or collusion by any party, the banking details are attached.
Imperial Transfer Ltd. (Imperialtransferltd.com) will be the assigned transfer agent of record they will be responsible for retrieving your signed share certificates after you have received your settlement payment.
If you agree to the terms of this settlement as there is no negotiation and all fees must be paid prior to collecting your settlement funds, as your settlement funds will not be released to BOC International Ltd for distribution until the required fees have been collected, those are your terms for settlement by order of the China Securities Regulatory Commission.
To expedite this transaction, we need you to initial the invoice and send back as well as the banking form filled out as to where you want your settlement proceeds, and when you have made your fees transfer, please remit a transfer copy, we’re very efficient and expeditious, you will have your proceeds within 14 days of fees being collected and credited thanks again for your response I hope I have made this transaction process very clear.
Thank you for your interest and participation
Best Regards,
Li (Lee) Liang
Sr, VP International Banking
Bank of China, International Holdings LTD.
Ying Tai Business Center
#28 Finance St, Tower 2 15th Floor
Xicheng District, Beijing 100000
We have copied below a couple of the documents which the scammers have been using. Any text that might reveal the identity of the investor who sent this to us has been blacked out.
LXK Scam_Fake Confirmation Of Funds_Source Details Redacted.
LXK Scam_Fake Regulator Announcement.
LXK Scam_Fake Escrow Arrangements.
These documents might fool some people but it’s quite easy to prove this is a scam. For a start, we took a look at the email address they use. They use the domain suffix of “bocxbj.com” e.g [email protected] as seen above. We assume the ‘boc’ was intended to stand for Bank of China and the ‘xbj’ is possibly meant to suggest Beijing. We did a quick check on this domain history. This domain was purchased in November 2019. We’re fairly sure that the Beijing branch of Bank Of China would have been using email before November 2019. The other thing we can say with a fair degree of confidence is that it is highly unlikely that Bank of China runs its operations through servers located in MISSOURI, KANSAS ! That’s where the servers for ‘bocxbj’ are located.
The email advises investors that share transfer documents will be handled by Imperial Transfer Ltd with the website address https://imperialtransferltd.com/ . It’s a rubbish website, but that’s not surprising. The domain was only bought in January 2022. This scam is only a couple of months old.
The email finishes with a clever trick. They provide a link to their website. Only it’s not their website because it doesn’t use the domain name they use. It’s the website of a company that was formed 20 years ago. They hope that the intended victim doesn’t spot that the website address is different to their address.
If you ever receive anything claiming to be from the Bank of China or from the China Securities Regulatory Commission requiring you to pay money to recover an investment you made, your first thought should always be – SCAM ! Check it out thoroughly before you even think about paying any money. There is a 99.999% probability it’s a scam.
LXK Inc / Wellington Capital Group Scam.
Since this article was published, two money mule bank accounts linked to the scam have been identified. Further details can be found in this article – SKY CAPITAL HOLDINGS INC MONEY MULE ACCOUNT.
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