Resolution no. 20363

Order, pursuant to Article 7-octies, Paragraph 1, Letter b), of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 (Consolidated Law on Finance) to discontinue the infringement of Article. 18 of the Consolidated Law on Finance performed via the www.forexgrand.com website

LA COMMISSIONE NAZIONALE PER LE SOCIETÀ E LA BORSA
[THE NATIONAL COMMISSION FOR COMPANIES AND THE STOCK EXCHANGE]

HAVING REGARD TO Law no. 216 of June 7, 1974, and subsequent amendments and additions;

HAVING REGARD TO Legislative Decree no. 58 of February 24, 1998 ("Consolidated Law on Finance") and subsequent amendments and additions;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that, from checks on the www.forexgrand.com website, it emerged that:

i. the www.forexgrand.com website, registered in anonymous form by a user whose identity is not known, is also available in Italian;

ii. the potential investor, after the registration on the said website and the opening of an account via a specific form available online, has the opportunity to trade on the currency market (FOREX) and in CFDs, indexes, shares and precious metals through a MT4 platform;

iii. in order to carry out trading transactions, an investment of money is required to be paid into the account opened online. In particular, the said website offers various types of account, namely "Basic", "Gold" and "Platinum", distinguished above all by the minimum deposit required and by the benefits;

iv. in the "Contact Us" section and at the bottom of all the pages of the said website, the Grand Services Ltd company, with alleged office in Marshall Islands, and the Nordic Pearl Limited company, with alleged office in Bulgaria, are mentioned as follows, “This site is owned by Grand Services Ltd […] and is operated by Nordic Pearl Limited”;

v. the www.forexgrand.com website and the services offered therein are therefore attributable to the Nordic Pearl Limited and Grand Services Ltd companies.

HAVING ALSO ESTABLISHED that, according to the information available, people operating in the name of “ForexGrand” have contacted Italian investors by telephone in order to convince them to open an account and trade on the said website;

HAVING ESTABLISHED to this regard that Nordic Pearl Limited and Grand Services Ltd use even immediate forms of contact and interaction with Italian clients, including via the aforementioned website, providing procedural and operational instructions for investing in financial instruments;

HAVING CONSIDERED that the operations described above, including via the www.forexgrand.com website, are directed towards the Italian investing public, insofar as the Italian version of the said website can be accessed from the said domain and has no blocking mechanism in place to prevent Italian users from registering;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that the activities carried out via the said website can be classed as the provision of investment services as referred to in Art. 1, Par. 5 of the Consolidated Law on Finance, insofar as clients are offered the opportunity of opening a trading account against which purchase and/or sale orders for financial instruments can be issued;

HAVING CONSIDERED that the provision of investment services and activities is reserved for authorised subjects as referred to under Article 18, Par. 1 of the Consolidated Law on Finance, pursuant to which “The professional provision of investment services and activities for the public is reserved for investment firms and banks”;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that Nordic Pearl Limited and Grand Services Ltd are not authorised to provide investment services to the Italian public, insofar as these companies are not registered on the dedicated register held by CONSOB pursuant to Art. 20 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that the operations in question can be classed as the professional provision of investment services involving financial instruments to the Italian public, in infringement of Art. 18, para. 1, of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING CONSIDERED that, as provided for by Art. 7-octies of the Consolidated Law on Finance - entitled “Powers to counteract abuse” - CONSOB “may, with regard to anyone who offers or carries out investment services or activities through the Internet without being qualified therefore pursuant to this decree: a) make public, even by way of a precaution, the circumstance that the party is not authorised to carry out the activity indicated by article 1, paragraph 5; b) order that the infringement cease”;

HEREBY RESOLVES:

The order is issued to cease the infringement of Art .18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 also performed through the www.forexgrand.com website, consisting of the provision of investment services and activities to the Italian public.

This Resolution shall be notified to those concerned and published in CONSOB”s Bulletin.

This measure may be appealed with the Regional Administrative Court of Lazio within 60 days from the date of notification.

28 marzo 2018

THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN
Anna Genovese