Israel’s Knesset panel to go into session to fight the binary options fraudsters

Israel’s central government has scheduled a session for the panel that has been assembled to fight the out of control and fraudulent binary options industry which has its roots firmly in the ground in Israel, even though most of the activity of these criminal entities is conducted abroad.

Last week, the government of the State of Israel set in place a schedule for the first hearing on the binary options business, which will be heard in early January, setting in place the official, government-level plans instigated by Israel Securities Authority chairman Professor Shmuel Hauser, and Attorney General Amichai Mandelblit to obliterate the entire business, which Professor Hauser has referred to publicly as ‘filth’.

he hearing, to be held by the Knesset State Control Committee, will take place in the Knesset on Monday, January 2, at 11 a.m. and is open to members of the public provided they register in advance.

The Knesset State Control Committee oversees the work of the State Comptroller and is responsible for auditing and criticizing the executive branch and pointing out corruption or negligence on the part of the governing bureaucracy. As such, it is usually chaired by a member of a Knesset opposition party.

Karine Elharar, from the Yesh Atid party (Hebrew for “There is a future”), who currently chairs the committee, told The Times of Israel last week that she decided to convene a hearing on binary options after concluding that the government’s response to the largely fraudulent industry has been lacking.

“Several months ago I was approached and made aware of the painful subject of binary options. After an extensive examination I reached the conclusion that what the government is doing to tackle this issue is insufficient.”

MK Elharar further stated: “It is not acceptable that people are able to operate from Israel and cheat people around the world. Not for nothing has binary options been outlawed in Israel [targeting Israelis], and now we must make sure it will not be possible to do this to people in other countries.”

In October, The Chairman of the Israel Securities Authority (ISA) Professor Shmuel Hauser has made it one of his top priorities to be able to implement a law and expedite such a law that would prevent the entire binary options business from operating anywhere in the world.

In France, Belgium, Israel, the United States, Germany, Holland, China and Denmark, binary options are classified as illegal due to their fraudulent and deceitful nature, thus no firm is allowed to operate on their territories, although it is very clear that these firms continue to flout such rules and are still duping American customers, several years after the ban, as detailed by extensive FinanceFeeds research and despite Banc de Binary, one of the world’s largest binary options brands, having been fined $11 million for doing just that.

It is simply a case of the mentality of the operators in that if they are prepared to steal from unsuspecting members of the public by offering a weighted gambling platform disguised as a financial product with no remorse, then they are likely not to have any regard for any national laws, especially where they do not reside.

Professor Hauser has managed to get binary options banned in the domestic Israeli market, but his concern is that almost all of the firms and their suppliers are based in Israel, operating as a merry gang of criminals, fleecing people overseas, thus the Israeli legal system has no jurisdiction over a company whose owners may be in Israel but is registered in an offshore jurisdiction and targets people all over the world. This is what he wants to change – and it is now looking very likely that he will succeed.

As last the second quarter of 2016 drew to a close, Professor Hauser requested permission from Israel’s Attorney General Amichai Mandelblit to amend the law so that it can prohibit the marketing of binary options from anywhere in Israel to anywhere in the world, including from any commercial structure (many of these slippery characters disguise their operations as marketing or service firms that support their real firm abroad).

This was broadcast nationally on Israeli television, and was featured in October on a broadcast of the Laila Calcali (Hebrew for Economic Night) show on Channel Ten.

“Israel’s fraudulent binary options industry is an ugly phenomenon that harms innocent people and unfortunately fans the flames of negative perceptions of Israelis and Jews. We must do everything possible to eradicate this phenomenon” – Professor Shmuel Hauser, Chairman, Israel Securities Authority

Think you can run away to a different country? No chance!

Ah, I hear you say. But what if these binary options firms get wind of such an imminent law, and decide to run away to Panama or the Cayman Islands, and then carry on from there?

The interesting thing here is that – before any of these urchins and scalliwags decide that it is a good idea to up sticks and move away from Israel, it is worth considering that there is a very commonly used and very effective law in Israel called צו עיכוב יציאה מהארץ (transliteration from Hebrew: Tzav Ichuv Yitziah Mi HaAretz) which is a central point of not only Israeli criminal law, but also civil law.

This means that if this practice is outlawed and any criminal trials take place, NONE of the owners of any of these firms, or their directors, will be allowed to leave the country at all, thus they will be made to face the music. If a civil or regulatory lawsuit is brought against them, they also will not be allowed to leave the country.

Considering the government’s disdain for these firms and the pressure from regulators and governments around the world that have banned it and cited several million having been taken from customers, this is exactly what would be invoked.

To give an idea of how often used and how strict this law is, if you are Israeli, and you do not pay a bill such as council tax or healthcare, you would not be allowed to leave the country until the debt was settled. If you scam someone for a small amount, and that person complains to a court, you cannot leave the country until it is resolved, and this also usually includes leins on bank accounts and seizure of assets which is done by a central computer very quickly.

Professor Hauser has previously referred to the binary options business as ‘disgusting’ and stated that he has a personal responsibility to quash the entire business, and in the aftermath of several bans from many firms across the world plus massive global media coverage in mainstream newspapers including British newspaper The Times having labeled it a complete fraud, an unofficial industry body has now been formed by several owners of brands and platform provider/market makers to attempt to deflect the imminent jaws of the crusher.

Professor Hauser, in his address to the audience on Wednesday last week’s TV report on Channel Ten, resorted to quoting talmudic prophecies by quoting directly from the Hebrew teachings:

“The destroyers and layers of waste that go forth from among you (Isaiah 49:17).”

In modern Hebrew, that phrase is used to refer to ‘enemies within’ who bring ruin upon the society that raised them.

Indeed, Professor Hauser takes this matter just as literally and as personally, believing that his parents were founding fathers of the State of Israel and he cannot bear watching the country that his family built have its fine reputation ruined by ne’erdowells who could not care less. (There are many others who echo his line of thinking – Ed).

MK Elharar said, “to make sure this activity is stopped and that all [law enforcement] bodies coordinate their efforts to this end.”

An adviser to MK Elharar told The Times of Israel that representatives from the Israel Securities Authority, the Israel Police, the State Prosecutor’s Office and the attorney general’s office had been summoned to appear before the Members of Knesset.

“We will sit everyone down and examine what has been done and what else can be done, and — if it can’t be done within the scope of the existing law — what new legislation will have to be introduced,” said the adviser.

Currently, the entire binary options business is casting a shadow over the bona fide electronic trading industry globally, and for our interests as well as those of future customers, this must be removed.

FinanceFeeds absolutely supports the initiative by the State of Israel toward making central government laws to remove the binary options business and to prosecute its main figures for the tremendous damage that they have done and are continuing to do.

A look down the list of names of  those involved in the establishment of the business reveals some less than salubrious individuals, many of whom have been involved in previous fraudulent activity – Shai Ben Asulin, for example, took his part in a $33 million scam involving several individuals for which he was censured by the SEC. He went on to found Anyoption.

Banc de Binary, one of the largest brands in the world, has a litany of fraudulent activity behind it, and many of the behavioral traits of employees of binary brands involve stealing leads and selling them to other gambling or binary shops, swindling members of the public by recycling poker or casino leads to co-owned binary brands and attempting to convince them that these are investment platforms based in bona fide jurisdictions, often using fake names and fake addresses.

This year, FinanceFeeds managed to succeed in lobbying Southampton Football Club to drop its sponsorship deal with Banc de Binary, the club doing so once realizing the potential damage being an ambassador to a firm that means its fans and the general public absolute harm would do.

FinanceFeeds is aware of office raids by police on binary options firms, arrests of shareholders and co-founders and various unlawful conduct being part of their remit.

The low-end yobbish nature of the binary options industry’s largest players has run right through to the brands themselves, and anyone who challenges them is often threatened with physical violence.

No private school education, Merrill Lynch internships, technology peerages at MIT or blue chip institutional prowess matched to the polished commercial manners that we know and love about our fantastic industry are anywhere to be seen among the gold chain-toting monsters that operate binary options firms.

January 2 is only a few days away, and could signal the first right step by the Israeli government toward doing the right thing, and moving toward a year in which the shadow of the back street binary options fraudsters disappears.

Photo: Knesset (Israeli Parliament), Jerusalem