The Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced on Tuesday the decision of the US court for a permanent injunction and monetary penalty against Ztegrity Inc. and owner Troy Mason.
The US watchdog brought charges of fraudulent solicitation and failing to register with the CFTC in June last year. According to the website of the fraudulent scheme, it has received over $460,000 from 411 participants.
Mason and Ztegrity were ordered to pay $643,570 in restitution to victims, as well as $300,000 civil monetary penalty. Additionally, the regulator found that the defendants illegally operated a commodity pool by failing to register as commodity pool operators, which is in violation of the CEA and CFTC regulations. The court imposed permanent registration and trading bans on the defendants.
The forex scheme
According to the CFTC, the fraudulent scheme ran from October 2019 to June 2021. The operators used different websites and social media platforms to advertise their forex trading pool “The Black Club” and “The Forex Savings Club.” They were marketed as a version of a savings account that offered a greater yield with low or no risk.
The defendants even guaranteed to repay participants their funds and promised “with a 100% certainty” to generate “substantial profit[s]”
The CFTC stated:
In truth, the defendants knew or recklessly failed to appreciate that no forex trader can guarantee profitable trading, or the avoidance of losses required to guarantee all participants’ contributions, and knew, but failed to inform participants, they had no U.S.-based forex trading accounts.
