Three people have been convicted for investment fraud and sentenced to a total of 24.5 years, following an Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) prosecution.
A fourth person was convicted for trading without authorisation.
On 3 April, after an eight-week trial at Southwark Crown Court, Cameron Vickers, Raheel Mirza and Opeyemi Solaja were convicted of conspiracy to defraud through a fake, London-based company Bespoke Markets Group (BMG).
The FCA reported that “their scam fleeced roughly £1.2m ($1.5m, €1.4m) from around 120 UK investors”.
Mirza was also convicted of perverting the course of justice and the fourth defendant, Reuben Akpojaro, was convicted for trading investments without FCA authorisation. He was acquitted of conspiracy to defraud and money laundering.
Details
Between 2016 and 2020, the quartet made cold calls to members of the public, using pseudonyms, to persuade them to invest with BMG. They set up UK and offshore companies and bank accounts to seek to distance themselves from the fraud and for money laundering.
They claimed to trade their clients’ money in binary options. In reality, the money was shared among the fraudsters and spent on foreign travel, cosmetic dentistry, gambling, property, a wedding reception and in nightclubs.
To encourage people to invest or invest more, BMG offered to match investments with their own funds and refund losses in the first three-six months. The investors had access to an online platform that appeared to show their funds being traded, but this was manipulated to show trading activity when there was none.
Rogue traders
In sentencing, the trial judge described BMG as “no more than a money-making machine” and the defendants as “a loose confederation of criminally minded associates”.
Vickers was sentenced to seven and a half years in jail, as was Solaja. Vickers claimed to be the ‘trading-floor manager’ and met investors in person to encourage them to invest.
Mirza was sentenced to eight years for the conspiracy to defraud offence and another 18 months for perverting the course of justice. His role was setting up and running the BMG offices and the phone lines. All three were disqualified from being company directors for 10 years.
The fourth fraudster, Akpojaro, is due to be sentenced next month.
Therese Chambers, executive director, enforcement and market oversight at the FCA, said: “We will continue to identify and disrupt rogue traders operating in the UK. BMG was a sham, and despite their best efforts to conceal their true nature with their offshore accounts, this operation shows we will take fraudsters to task and protect UK investors.”
Binary options
Binary options became FCA regulated in January 2018. They are a high-risk, ‘all-or-nothing’ type of investment where 80% of investors lose their money.
Traders attempt to predict whether an event will happen or not and if they win, they will see a return, but if they are wrong, they will lose all their investment.
Binary options have been banned for retail use since July 2018.
Applications under the Proceeds of Crime legislation are being made to recover as much money as possible from the defendants for the benefit of the victims.
