Head of Global FX Club in plea negotiations with US govt
The parties in the criminal case accusing Michael S. Wright of fraud have been in plea negotiations, the US government told Judge Paul A. Engelmayer in a Letter.
Further to FinanceFeeds’ report about the criminal case against Michael S. Wright, head of Wright Time Capital Group LLC, doing business as Global FX Club, the US government has announced that it is in plea negotiations with the defendant.
In a letter addressed to Judge Paul A. Engelmayer of the New York Southern District Court, Assistant United States Attorney Jacob Warren says that the parties in the case, captioned USA v. Wright (1:17-cr-00459), have been in plea negotiations and need more time to reach an agreement. Plea bargaining is a common practice in criminal cases, typically allowing the defendant to plead guilty to the charges in exchange for a less severe sentence.
The Judge has agreed to adjourn the hearing to October 13, 2017.
Mr Wright is accused of, inter alia, having falsely represented to investors that their money was used in off-exchange Forex transactions and of having used investor funds in a Ponzi-like manner to make payments to other investors.
According to the indictment, Mr Wright is charged on two counts: commodity fraud and wire fraud. He has to forfeit all property that is derived from proceeds from the offenses committed, including the sum of money generated from the said offenses.
Mr Wright was arraigned on July 28, 2017.
The criminal proceedings against Mr Wright have led to the staying of the civil action against him brought by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in June. The CFTC charged Mr Wright and his companies with fraud, misappropriation, and issuing false account statements in connection with a pooled investment in Forex trading.
Specifically, the CFTC Complaint stated that from approximately August 2010 through the present, Defendants engaged in a fraudulent scheme to solicit more than $400,000 from at least 10 members of the public, promising to use pool participant funds for FX trading. Defendants allegedly traded only a part of pool participants’ funds and misappropriated the bulk of those funds for unauthorized personal or business expenses such as food, clothing, jewelry, and entertainment.
