ACFX withdrawal problem extends beyond four months in China, executive team have all moved on – Investigation
Four months have passed since ACFX had its license suspended by CySec. Chinese traders and IBs are still awaiting their withdrawals, with, according to sources, up to 100 customers affected. All members of ACFX senior management have now left, with many having been hired by LCG.
On April 7 this year, retail FX brokerage ACFX, an acronym for Atlas Capital, was the subject of a license suspension by Cypriot financial markets regulatory authority CySec. A generic rationale was provided in a public report by the regulator as to why this action was taken.
Indeed, CySec cited that the firm had failed to comply with certain regulatory provisions, however it was not specified as to what exactly they were.
Just over four months have now passed since this action was taken, a period during which FinanceFeeds conducted an investigation into the company’s responsibilities towards its clients, and in particular, the processing of client withdrawal.
Two months ago, FinanceFeeds reported that the entire management team of ACFX left the company, with several customers from various regions of the world having been left high and dry.
This week, FinanceFeeds has been approached by clients in China, several of whom have not received withdrawals which were requested in March, just a few weeks before CySec suspended ACFX’s license, and the disappearance of the senior management of the company.
Remarkably, many former senior ACFX executives have now been hired by LCG (formerly London Capital Group), following a reduction in existing staff by LCG of approximately 20 people at approximately the same time as the firm having onboarded the former ACFX executives.
Despite the senior management having moved on to LCG, ACFX continues to owe withdrawals to a substantial number of customers, and a large group of Chinese traders have now come forward to explain that their requests for withdrawals have gone unanswered and no monies have been received.
Sources close to the matter in mainland China have explained to FinanceFeeds that approximately 100 traders are awaiting their withdrawals, with requests dating back to the middle of March this year.
One particular trader, who is also an introducing broker, explained today to FinanceFeeds “As an example, one of my accounts at ACFX has a balance of $ 12,100 and I put my withdrawal request in for this account on March 28, 2016 however absolutely no confirmation of its receipt has been sent, and there is no withdrawal.”
A further client of ACFX in China said “I know that all of the ACFX customers that I am aware of on the mainland have not received any withdrawals from ACFX. Many of my clients have explained this to me, and there are groups with several ACFX customers that have several pending withdrawal requests.”
Indeed, a litany of complaints surrounding this matter now adorn public forums, indicating that the tardiness with regard to withdrawals is no longer limited to Chinese introducing brokers and their clients, but is now widespread across many region in which ACFX conducted its business.
During our investigation, FinanceFeeds contacted several clients who allege that they have been affected by this, as well as made investigations into the operational structure at ACFX by contacting existing and former employees of the company.
One particular trader that we spoke to recently is an experienced trader who holds accounts with several brokerages in various regions, including Australia, Cyprus, UK and Belize and explained to FinanceFeeds that he has never had any issues until now.
“Things got slow with withdrawals when I won large amounts (some hundreds of thousands USD) off another Cyprus broker in August 2015, then again in January 2016. This coincided with China Black Monday and the oil price drop plus commodity currency drops. There were reports of this happening on greater scale with much bigger traders than me” said the trader
“Anyway all along I had an account manager at ACFX, Rasha Gad. It was apparently a surprise to all when on 7th April ACFX’s license got suspended by Cysec. The first thing I know is that all my trades turned “Close Only” on the Metatrader trading platform, as I was trying to roll over some of my positions at that time. I generally rolled over positions every day, but I did not use ACFX account to scalp – with very rare exceptions” he explained.
“My balance, once I had everything closed was almost $84,000, which was a significant proportion of my trading capital (and personal wealth)”
A month ago, a very reliable source explained to FinanceFeeds “LCG has recently hired the management that lead ACFX to bankruptcy. This will be the final blow for LCG.”
One particular senior ACFX executive explained to FinanceFeeds “Please do continue your investigation and I hope you will do your job to the best standards and you will reveal who hurt ACFX and why those who did all went there (LCG). For now that’s it from my side.” [sic]
Today, FinanceFeeds contacted Andreas Michaelides, former Head of Investment Research at ACFS (Atlas Capital Financial Services division of ACFX) for his comments on the hiring of certain key ACFX staff by LCG, who said “I have nothing to add.”
