We said that this was coming.
Following a wave of reviews of some of the largest Cyprus-based regulated forex and binary options brokers undertaken by financial regulator CySEC over the past few months, we reported in late November on a number of fairly large (by Cyprus standards) > €100,000 fines and settlements issued to a number of CIF licensed brokers.
And we reported exclusively at the time that this was just Round One, and that CySEC was far from finished its review.
Today we now see Round Two, with a €350,000 settlement made with binary options broker Banc de Binary – the largest of the recent wave of CySEC fines/settlements – and a €156,000 fine issued to Rodeler Limited, the parent company of binary options brand 24option.com as well as 24FX, GrandOption and QuickOption.
The Banc de Binary settlement announcement (see link below) divulged very little, probably part of the settlement agreement with BDB.
The fine to Rodeler / 24option was a lot more detailed. It was broken down by issues including:
- €10,000 – handling of client complaints, other admin issues
- €20,000 – managing operational risk
- €30,000 – not acting fairly in regards to client bonuses
- €30,000 – misleading advertising
- €40,000 – not properly assessing clients for appropriate trading
We again expect that CySEC’s review of, and settlement negotiations with, other licensed brokers is far from over, and that there is indeed still more of the like to come.
One more thought on the matter. Given that the ‘settlements’ have been much larger than the actual fines, it seems to us that some firms (such as Banc de Binary here) are agreeing to pay more in order to settle quickly and quietly – to keep any specific wrongdoing out of the press. As per above, the firms which don’t agree to settle (and we assume that most of those firms which did get fined had the opportunity to negotiate a settlement) end up paying less, but have to deal with the negative press where their wrongdoing is specified and spelled out.
More on the settlement with Banc de Binary can be seen here.
More on the fine to Rodeler Limited can be seen here.