Resolution no. 20373

Order pursuant to Art. 7-octies, paragraph 1, letter b), of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 (‘Consolidated Law on Finance’) to discontinue the infringement performed via the www.worldfxm.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, according to the information available, people operating in the name of ‘Worldfxm’ have contacted Italian investors by telephone in order to persuade them to open an account and trade on the said website, providing procedural and operational instructions for investing in financial instruments;

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

i. the potential investors, subject to registration on the website and opening an account via the dedicated form available online, can trade on the foreign currency market (Forex) and in CFDs, precious metals and indexes through the MT4 platform;

ii. in order to perform the trading transactions, investors are requiredto invest money via payment into an account opened online. In particular, the said website offers various types of account, namely ‘Silver’, ‘Gold’ and ‘Platinum’, distinguished above all by the minimum deposit required and the benefits;

iii. the website in question has not indications to subjects to whom the operations performed via the worldfxm.com website may be attributed.

HAVING CONSIDERED that the activities carried out via the said website can be classed as the provision of investment services referred to in Art. 1, para. 5, of the Consolidated Law on Finance, insofar as clients are offered the opportunity to open a trading account against which they can issue purchase and/or sales orders of financial instruments;

HAVING CONSIDERED that, although the www.worldfxm.com website is no longer available in Italian, Italian clients are in any case contacted for the purpose of persuading them to open a trading account on the same website;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that, as explained above, it is not possible to identify any subject to whom the operations performed via the www.worldfxm.com website may be attributed;

HAVING CONSIDERED that the operations performed through the aforementioned website are not attributable to any company authorised to perform professional investment services towards the Italian public; indeed, the company mentioned on the www.worldfxm.com website is not found to be registered on the register held by CONSOB pursuant to Art. 20 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING CONSIDERED that the provision of investment services and activities is reserved for authorised subjects as referred to under Article 18, para. 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, therefore, 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, pursuant to Art. 7-octies of the Consolidated Law on Finance - “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:

To order the cessation of the infringement of Art .18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 also performed via the www.worldfxm.com websites, 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.

5 April 2018

THE DEPUTY CHAIRMAN
Anna Genovese