stratxmarkets

Access Corporate – May 2019

Access Corporate – May 2019 400 267 Safe or Scam Support

Access Corporate Ltd was a money mule company used by the binary option fraud which operated under the name of StratXMarkets.

SOS was able to trace some of the payments made by a client to a Metro Bank account which we believed was owned by Access Corporate Ltd. We challenged the company over its relationship with StratXMarkets and were not happy with the response we received. We then assisted a client in taking remedial action through the UK court process.

On 22nd May 2019 a Judge at the High Court in London issued an order to wind up Access Corporate Ltd. The case was brought by a Safe Or Scam client who had lost a considerable sum of money in the StratXMarkets scam.

There will now be an investigation into the company by the Official Receiver or by an insolvency practitioner appointed by the Official Receiver.

The company director, Mr Derrick Williams, had tried to avoid an investigation by placing Access Corporate Ltd into a company voluntary liquidation before the hearing. If creditors do not act quickly when a CVL is initiated it gives directors an opportunity to push through a very quick liquidation with no investigation. Mr Williams had already appointed his own preferred liquidation firm and had provided it with a list of creditors. That list did not include our client. Clearly there was an intent to speed through a dissolution without fully informing the liquidator of all creditors.

The liquidation firm was contacted and informed of our client’s claim. The result was that the court case was allowed to proceed and a judgement was made in favour of our client. There will now be a proper and detailed investigation into the business of Access Corporate Ltd. We expect the investigation to have both financial and criminal repercussions for the company director.

There were several other money mule companies involved in StratXMarkets and we are now turning our attention to those companies.

To view the previous post on StratXMarkets please click HERE

binary option scams

Binary Option Scams

Binary Option Scams 300 200 Safe or Scam Support

On 22nd May 2019 one of our clients will be represented in the High Court in London in a case involving Access Corporate Ltd, a money mule which collected investment money from investors on behalf of binary option scams. One of these companies was operating under the trading name of StratXMarkets.

Binary Option scams were widespread between 2015 to 2018 before financial regulators around the world took action to make this form of trading a regulated activity. Most of the companies offering these trades were scam companies. Many of them claimed to be incorporated in the Marshall Islands although there is no evidence to back up whether any of those companies actually exist. The Marshall Islands is a highly secretive jurisdiction. 

The lack of information on the companies made opening bank accounts difficult which is why many of them used money mules. Money mules are individuals or companies which are prepared to allow their bank accounts to take in investors’ money on behalf of the binary option scam companies. They then pass that money on to the scam companies or to another money mule which is also part of the chain. Money mules are playing a risky game because they are accessories to fraud and can be prosecuted.

We have several of these money mules in our sights and are having some success in tracing them and taking them to task. Investors often believe that once a binary option scam company has disappeared they have no possibility of ever finding them and recovering their money. That is not always the case. They often leave a trail. It is not a quick and easy process to trace these people but in many cases it can be done.

The owner of Access Corporate Ltd, Mr Derrick Williams, is a wealthy individual with a house near London valued at £1.8m and a villa in Spain. It is unclear how he made his money, but we think we know how he made some of it…..   

StratXMarkets – 2

StratXMarkets – 2 150 150 Safe or Scam Support

A legal action was started in November 2018 against Access Corporate Ltd, a cash mule company used by the StratXMarkets binary option scam.

Safe Or Scam has been working with clients who paid $500,000 into the bank account of Access Corporate as an investment into StratXMarkets. We helped devise the strategy which has led to Access Corporate Ltd being required to attend a hearing at the High Court in London at the end of February 2019.

The registered office of the company is described on this Companies House link as 36 South Approach, Northwood, HA6 2ET.

Legal papers were served at the registered office which the Process Server described as a large residential house on a golf course. Rightmove estimates the value of the property at more than £1.6m.

The response of the director of Access Corporate Ltd to Stage One of the legal action was to declare that “the company has never had a contract or agreement with the investor”. That response was deemed inadequate. The company was charged by our team with taking in $500,000 of investors’ money to which it was not entitled and being part of a scheme to defraud investors. The director conveniently avoided mentioning the money or the bank account in his response.

Following our client’s rebuttal of the company’s response, Access Corporate Ltd appointed a law firm to defend itself against the claim. Unfortunately it was too late. The solicitor raised a series of objections but was outside of the time allowed under Stage One. The objections were registered two days after the deadline laid down by law. We had already moved onto Stage Two.

The company’s solicitor claimed that although the sole director of the company owned the registered office property where the papers were served, he is rarely there as his main residence is his villa in Spain. That is no defence. A plaintiff is required to serve papers at a company’s registered office and it is irrelevant to the plaintiff if the company director is never there.

At Stage Two the company had another time limit in which to respond to the new legal papers. It did not do so by the deadline.

Access Corporate Ltd will have the opportunity to defend itself in court. We will be demanding an explanation as to the role of Access Corporate Ltd in this investment and evidence of where investors’ money was sent once it was received by Access Corporate Ltd. We are making excellent progress in exposing this scam.

There are at least three other companies which acted as cash mules for StratXMarkets and took in money from our clients. An action has already started against one of those companies. Actions against the others will follow.

For more information on the binary option scams we are investigating please visit our separate website here.

To view the previous blog relating to StratXMarkets on this website please click here


Busy Start

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The new year is only nine days old and our investigations into dodgy investments are back into full flow.

A low-cost legal action which was started in December against Clear View Marketing Services Ltd / European Property Coin took another step forward this week. We will be able to update investors on that at the end of the month.

The same is true of our action against a company involved in the huge StratXMarkets binary options scam. Lawyers representing the defendants in the claim appeared for the first time today. We think they will struggle to convince a court of their client’s innocence. Our client invested several hundred thousand pounds and they have failed to adequately respond to his claim or to explain their involvement. We think that as a result of our investigations this could easily end up with criminal charges being raised against the perpetrators.

Another conference call is arranged with a UK solicitor representing property owners in the Prosperity site at Bentley Court and Parkwood Court in Keighley. The call will be on 10th January where the solicitor will give an overview of his experience and an outline of the case against the opponents.

We have finally put a proposal to investors in the Essex and London Properties scam. It has taken a long time because of a Police investigation and the involvement of the Official Receiver but both a barrister and a UK solicitor believe there is a viable case against some of the parties involved. Conference calls with the solicitor are being set up so that investors can ask any questions they wish to raise.

The OurSpace Workspaces Ponzi Scheme investigation is going well. The administrator appointed by Kevan Halliwell / OurSpace Investments Ltd (Malta company) remains reluctant to answer straightforward and direct questions. We have had no answers to three emails, the earliest one was sent on 11th December 2018. In our opinion they are administrating a company that does not own the assets which Halliwell claims it does. Halliwell and Douglass tried to stitch up investors by removing the assets from investor control but they messed it up. This one will run for a long time. We asked the administration firm to advise us of their first contact with Kevan Halliwell and OurSpace. We asked if it was in 2017 when the asset transfer was being considered. They have not yet replied.

The Final Letter Before Action was issued to Simon Whittley of St Helier Capital Management Ltd, Win River Developments Ltd, Hawksbill Property Holdings PLC and others. There’s a lot of scams linked to one person. This one is another case in which the defendant has no viable defence. We are looking forward to investors having their day in court with this one. Even his long-term accomplice Simon Paler has been distancing himself from the companies in recent months.

Finally, we have held discussions with professional firms and investors over the action which can be taken against the oil investments run by three men – Martin Finch, Glenn Jamie King and David Alexander Hyman. The oil investment companies are Osage 1 Ltd, Phenco Ltd, Sooner-Energy SPV-1 Ltd, Kansas MB Project Ltd and Kansas B2 Project Ltd. Our investigations are continuing but we believe there is light at the end of the tunnel for investors.

We have probably missed a few off but it has been a very busy start. Our aim is to help ordinary investors recover some of their money from scammers and we are having some success.

StratXMarkets Update

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SOS is working with investors who invested very large sums into StratXMarkets, a binary option scam. Typically binary option scams involve ‘cash mules’ i.e companies which act as accomplices to take in the investment money. They provide smokescreens making it difficult for investigators to follow the money and identify the main perpetrators of the scam. A typical large-scale binary option scam will often use dozens of cash mule companies.

Cash mules are by no means innocent parties. They know exactly what they are doing and they don’t expect to get caught. They are in effect accomplices in a fraud.

We are having success in identifying some of the people involved in the StratXMarkets scam. A legal process was started in November 2018 against a UK party we identified as having received £380,000 of investor funds. The party failed to adequately respond within the timeframe defined by law and we now look forward to the commencement of formal court action in January 2019.

There are other parties we have in our sights as having liability to refund further sums owed to investors. Action will also be taken against them in January 2019. We believe that if our investors are not refunded we will be in a position to press for criminal charges to be brought. Our separate binary option website can be viewed here.

If you have been the unfortunate victim of a binary option, trading or digital currency scam please contact us. We may be able to help.

To view the previous blog comment on StratXMarkets click here

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