Is www.onetwotrade.com a scam?
"OneTwoTrade is a binary option seller, and they are officially licensed by the Malta Gaming Authority. They are not in any way licensed or regulated as an investment, because they don't do actual investing. Is your money safe? If you mean will they take your money and run off with it, then no they probably won't just take your deposit and refuse to return any money to you for nothing - that would be a terrible way to make money for the long-term. If you mean ""will I lose my money?"" - oh yeah, you probably will! Binary options - outside of special sophisticate financial applications - are for people who think day trading has too little risk, or who would prefer online poker with a thin veneer of ""it's an investment!""  In the words of Forbes, Don't Gamble On Binary Options:  If people want to gamble, that’s their choice. But let’s not confuse   that with investing. Binary options are a crapshoot, pure and simple. These kinds of businesses run like a casino - there's a built-in house advantage, you are playing odds (which are against you), and the fundamental product is trying to bet on short-term volatility in financial markets. This is often ridiculously short-terms, measured in minutes. It's often  called ""all or nothing options"", because if you bet wrong you lose almost everything - they give you a little bit of the money you bet back (so you will bet again, preferably with more of your own money). If you bet correctly you get a pay-out, just like in craps or roulette. If you are looking to gamble online, this is one method to do it. But this isn't investing, you are as mathematically likely to lose your money and/or become addicted as any other form of money-based gambling, and absolutely treat it the same way you would a casino: decide how much money you are willing to spend on the adventure before you start, and expect you'll likely not get much or any of that money back. However, I will moralize on this point - I really hate being lied to. Casinos, sports betting, and poker all generally have the common decency to call it what it is - a game where you are playing/betting. These sorts of ""investment"" providers are woefully dishonest: they say it's an exciting financial market, a new type of investment, investors are moving to this to secure their futures, etc. It's utterly deceptive and vile, and it's all about as up-front and honest as penny auction websites. If you are going to gamble, I'd urge you to do it with people who have the decency to to call it gambling and not lie to you and ask for a ""minimum investment""." "It is a binary options market licensed by the ""gaming authority"" of Malta. One of the most liberal ""pay to play"" jurisdictions in the European Union. It sells access to tighter regulatory regimes. This is distinctly a gambling website, not licensed or protected by securities regulations. But that aside, even if they were able to masquerade more as a financial service, none of that dictates whether you will lose your money. Therefore try to find reviews from people that already use the site. This is not investing, a distinction I am able to make because no product they offer has positive expected value. Cash settled binary options do sound like a lot of fun though! And maybe you can make successful predictions in the allotted time period of the option. The things I would expect are issues withdrawing your funds, or unexplained fees."
"The link you originally included had an affiliate code included (now removed). It is likely that your ""friend"" suggested the site to you because there is something in it for your ""friend"" if you sign up with their link. Seek independent financial advice, not from somebody trying to earn a commission off you. Don't trust everything you read online – again, the advice may be biased.  Many of the online ""reviews"" for Regal Assets look like excuses to post affiliate links. A handful of the highly-ranked (by Google Search) ""reviews"" about this company even obscure their links to this company using HTTP redirects. Whenever I see this practice in a ""review"" for a web site, I have to ask if it is to try and appear more independent by hiding the affiliation? Gold and other precious metal commodities can be part of a diversified portfolio, a small part with some value as a hedge, but IMHO it isn't prudent to put all your eggs in that basket. Look up the benefits of diversification.  It isn't hard to find compelling evidence in favor of the practice.  You should also look up the benefits of low-fee passively-managed index funds. A self-directed IRA with a reputable broker can give you access to a wide selection of low-fee funds, not just a single risky asset class." The three sites mentioned in the second link are all professional trading workstations, not public web sites. There may not be free quotes available. Just browsed their website. Not a single name of anybody involved. Their application process isn't safe(No https usage while transferring private information).  And considering they contacted you rather than you contacting them, I will be very wary about how they got my details. And they are located in Indonesia. And a simple google takes me to a BOILER SCAM thread. So all in all you have been scammed. Try asking for your money back, but may not be that helpful. Next time before giving your money to somebody, do some due diligence. These type of scams aren't new and are very common. This guy is literally proposing a bucket shop. Trades against customers and copy their trades. No centralized clearing (it's not executing trades at all). And he thinks these are good things that customers should get him for.  Scam. And a very old one at that. I would suggest following your quote and having a read of the web page supplied, that buys then sells or sells short then buys (the same security on the same day) four or more times in five business days, ... So it is a two way transaction that counts as 'one'. or is this a form of money laundering? May not be, generally the amounts involved in money laundering are much higher. So if there are quite a few such transactions then yes it could be money laundering. It could also be for circumventing taxes, depending on country regulations one may try to do this to get around gift taxes etc. In this specific case it looks more of link harvesting / SEO optimization. Take a low cost item that is often searched and link to other product. if you see the company link on Amazon; Cougar takes you to shoes. So maybe on its own Cougar shoes does not rank high, so link it with similar name brand in different segment and try to boost the link. Yes, it’s a scam. Best case you will end up with nothing, worst case you wil end up losing money and facing criminal charges for fraud and/or money laundering.  Do not contact him again or respond to further contact. Forward his details to your local law enforcement if you have provided any of your personal information to him already. Pump-and-dump scams are indeed very real, but the scale of a single scam isn't anywhere near the type of heist you see in movies like Trading Places. Usually, the scammer will buy a few hundred dollars of a penny stock for some obscure small business, then they'll spam every address they have with advice that this business is about to announce a huge breakthrough that will make it the next Microsoft. A few dozen people bite, buy up a few thousand shares each (remember the shares are trading for pennies), then when the rise in demand pushes up the price enough for the scammer to make a decent buck, he cashes out, the price falls based on the resulting glut of stock, and the victims lose their money. Thus a few red flags shake out that would-be investors should be wary of: "I think you're right that these sites look so unprofessional that they aren't likely to be legitimate. However, even a very legitimate-looking site might be a fake designed to separate you from your money.  There is an entire underground industry devoted to this kind of fakery and some of them are adept at what they do.  So how can you tell? One place that you can consult is FINRA's BrokerCheck online service.  This might be the first of many checks you should undertake. Who is FINRA, you might ask?  ""The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) is the largest independent regulator for all securities firms doing business in the United States."" See here. My unprofessional guess is, even if a firm's line of business is to broker deals in private company shares, that if they're located in the U.S. or else dealing in U.S. securities then they'd still need to be registered with FINRA – note the ""all securities firms"" above. I was able to search BrokerCheck and find SecondMarket (the firm @duffbeer703 mentioned) listed as ""Active"" in the FINRA database. The entry also provides some information about the firm.  For instance, SecondMarket appears to also be registered with the S.E.C.. You should also note that SecondMarket links back to these authorities (refer to the footer of their site): ""Member FINRA | MSRB | SIPC.  Registered with the SEC as an alternative trading system for trading in private company shares.  SEC 606 Info [...]"" Any legitimate broker would want you to look them up with the authorities if you're unsure about their legitimacy. However, to undertake any such kind of deal, I'd still suggest more due diligence.  An accredited investor with serious money to invest ought to, if they are not already experts themselves on these things, hire a professional who is expert to provide counsel, help navigate the system, and avoid the frauds." The typical scam is that they overpay you - 'accidentially', or for some obscure reason they claim, and they ask you to wire the extra money either back or to someone else. Because you wire it, that money is gone for sure. Then they undo the original transaction (or it turns out it was fake anyway), and you end up with a loss. Maybe he claims that he wants to buy some more stuff, and the fees are high, so he sends you all the payments in one amount, and you pay the other sellers from it, something like that. There are honest nigerians though, actually most of them. Either way, the real problem is that the original payment is fake. Whichever way it comes to you, you need to make sure that it cannot be reversed or declared invalid after you think you have it. Wire transfer is the only way I know that is not reversible. Bank transfers are reversible; don't think you have it just because it arrives in your bank account. Talk to your bank about what all can happen. If you make the deal, when you send the bike, think about insuring it (and make him pay for that too). That way, you are out of any loss risk. "This is definitely a scam. My husband was inquiring with a ""company"" that was offering him to be. Representative for them. He got the same job details but the company was called Ceneo. I did due diligence and found that the real Ceneo has no problems receiving money directly from buyers around the world. The fake company mirrored their website, posted jobs on the net,hoping to ""employ"" unsuspecting people in the U.S. This is their reply to my husband when he asked the job details. DO NOT GET SCAMMED and held accountable for money laundering." What you found is that when your were on website X on day y when you clicked on the link they told you to buy 7 stocks and you performed an experiment, but the values went down. Somebody else on website A on day B saw a lightly different list, they may have been flat. But if you were on website W on day D that list hit the jackpot. Which of the three decided that the people running the ad knew what they were talking about? They could have tailored the list based on the nature of the website. Sports and recreation ones on ESPN, high tech on a computer focus site. They could have varied the size of the lit, they could have varied the way they described their analysis. They could have even varied the name of the expert to make it sound familiar or authoritative.  What you found was a marketing plan. It may have been a scam, or it may have been just a way to try and convince you they know what they were doing. If you clicked on the wrong list, they probably lost you as a potential customer, unless you can convince yourself that they were close, and deserve a second look.... "If you read the first sentence of the article, you'll notice that the orders were placed, then canceled.  The only reason this is done is to front run real incoming orders and get in.    ""Translation: the ultimate goal of many of these programs is to gum up the system so it slows down the quote feed to others and allows the computer traders (with their co-located servers at the exchanges) to gain a money-making arbitrage opportunity.""  If you are an investor without access to floor space within 3 meters of the exchange computer to place a computer of your own, you are being  defrauded of the true market price by this machine." "Yeah, it is probably best to keep away from Meyer International. It is apparently connected to some kind of business called ""Royal Siam Trust."" If you do any online research about Royal Siam Trust, the words ""scam"" and ""fraud"" seem to appear an awful lot. The name ""Richard Cayne"" comes up as well. Not a good sign....." "This is clearly a scam, and you should stay away from it. Anyone reading this knew that from the title alone - and it seems that you know it too. Don't ""test"" whether something is a scam by putting your own money in it. That is exactly how these scammers make money, and how you lose it. How their scam works is irrelevant. The simple fact is that there is no way you can safely earn 20% return over the course of a year, let alone in 1 day*. You know this is true. Don't bother trying to figure out what makes it true in this case. There is no free lunch. Best case scenario, this is a hyper-risky investment strategy [on the level of putting your money down at a roulette wheel]. Worst case scenario, they simply steal your money. Either way, you won't come out ahead. Although I agree with others that this is likely a Ponzi scheme, that doesn't really matter. What matters is, there is no way they can guarantee those returns. Just go to a casino and throw your money away yourself, if you want that level of risk.  *For reference, if you invested $100 for a year, earning 20% returns every day, you would have 6 million trillion trillion dollars by the end of the year. that's $6,637,026,647,624,450,000,000,000,000,000. that number doesn't even make sense. It's more money than exists on earth. So why would they need your $100?"