February 19 AtoZForex, Paris - The loyal and Swiss financial watchdog has done it again! Yesterday, three companies made it to FINMA's list (Switzerland's Financial Market Supervisory Authority) "of companies and individuals that may be operating without the requisite FINMA authorisation". This article's interest is focused on the recent act by the regulator, as FINMA issues warning against Golden Bridge FX.
Regulated by the FSCP?
Golden Bridge FX website (http://gb-fx.com) caters to English, Italian and Arabic speakers. They offer several financial services, online forex trading being one of them, on the MT4 platform. Additionally, Golden Bridge offers its investors the option to open Arabic and VIP accounts, besides the regular accounts.
FINMA issues warning against Golden Bridge FX, due to the fact that the broker has not been entered in commercial registrar of the Swiss jurisdiction. Yet, they've included the company's addressed as Chemin des mines 2, 1202 Genève. The firm's website states to be licensed by the Financial Services Provider (FSCP), which is in fact a registry "Independent Registration for Overseas Financial Service Companies" and not a local regulator.
FINMA's infamous list
It is one of the watchdog's major priorities to protect investors from firms who do not follow regulations in its jurisdiction. The way it goes about this is by issuing public warnings against such companies through their website. In it, FINMA makes it very clear that this list is in no way an indicator that the company's activities are illegal in nature, rather a precautionary measure while investigations are ongoing.
"The fact that a company is on the warning list does not automatically mean that its activities are unlawful. However, by entering such companies in the list, FINMA is highlighting the lack of authorization." - FINMA's pulic warning
Furthermore, FINMA's public warning segment goes on to state that once the investigation has been completed and the company cleared of any wrong-doing, or "the appropriate measures have been taken", will they then remove the company's name from the list.
Their method is rather simple and straightforward. "FINMA receives information that a provider is knowingly or unknowingly operating without authorization, it will investigate the matter." They do not mess around when it comes to firms found to be in breach of their regulations, and can enforce proceedings as severe as shutting down the company.
Check with you local regulator first!
That is why AtoZ encourages all of its readers to familiarize themselves with the industry before executing any investments. One way to do so, is to check with you local financial instrument regulator to find out if your future broker or firm has any outstanding warnings.
It is all too common for a firm in the industry to advertise investments services outside its regulator's jurisdiction. When this happens, local regulators will add such firms to their lists of companies not authorized to do so, as the evidence suggests. We've covered similar instances when binary options firms advertised outside their jurisdiction, ImperialOptions and FXMarker or BK Trading to name only the most recent warnings from a local European watchdog, landing them in local regulators' warning lists.
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