Resolution no. 20869

Order, pursuant to Art. 7-octies, para. 1, letter b), of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 (Consolidated Law on Finance) to cease the infringement of article 18 of the Consolidated Law on Finance performed through the websites www.grandfxpro.com, www.my.grandfxpro.com and www.tradegrandfxpro.com

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 7 June 1974 and subsequent amendments and additions;

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

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

i. the www.grandfxpro.com website, registered anonymously, is also available in Italian and has no mechanism in place to prevent the registration of Italian users;

ii. potential investors, subject to prior registration and the opening of an account, is offered the possibility of trading online via a platform called 'Metatrader4' in 'Shares, Indexes, Commodities, Forex and Cryptocurrencies';

iii. in order to perform the trading transactions, a investment of money is required, to be paid into an account opened online; in particular, there are various types of account available, with different names, according to the minimum deposit to be made and the promised benefits, ('basic' 'bronze', 'silver', 'gold', 'platinum' and 'black');

iv. following registration, you can access the web pages www.my.grandfxpro.com www.trade.grandfxpro.com, and www.trade.grandfxpro.com, through which it is possible, respectively, to log in to your account to make payments and use a demo version of the trading platform;

v. at the bottom of every page of the www.grandfxpro.com website 'Apsilon LTD', with declared registered address in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines is indicated; in the'Terms and Conditions' section, reference is made to an entity called 'Grand Fx Pro', indicated as 'the company'.

HAVING CONSIDERED that the activity carried out via the said website qualifies as the provision of investment services as referred to in art. 1, para. 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 aforementioned operations performed via the websites www.grandfxpro.com, www.my.grandfxpro.com and www.trade.grandfxpro.com are directed towards Italian investors, insofar as the website is also available in Italian;

HAVING CONSIDERED that the entity mentioned on the websites is not authorised to provide investment services to the Italian public, insofar as it is not registered on the dedicated register held by CONSOB pursuant to art. 20 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING REGARD to the fact that the provision of investment services and activities is reserved for the qualified subjects referred to in art. 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 that the operations in question qualify 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 REGARD TO the fact that, according 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 fact that the party is not authorised to perform the activity indicated in article 1, paragraph 5; b) order the party to cease the infringement';

HEREBY RESOLVES:

The order is issued to cease the infringement of art .18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/98 carried out through www.grandfxpro.com, www.my.grandfxpro.com and www.trade.grandfxpro.com consisting of the offering and performance of services and investment activities towards the Italian public.

This Resolution shall be brought to the attention of those concerned and published in the CONSOB Bulletin.

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

March 27^th, 2019

THE CHAIRMAN
Paolo Savona