Resolution no. 22257

Order, pursuant to article 7-octies, paragraph 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 via the website https://alphatradeplus.com and the respective webpage https://client.alphatradeplus.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 supplements;

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

HAVING ESTABLISHED that, from checks on the web, it emerged that:

i. the website https://alphatradeplus.com, which is active and also available in Italian, offers potential investors the possibility to trade CFDs on assets such as shares, indices and currencies;

ii. in order to place such trades, users must register with the website https://alphatradeplus.com, then open an account and deposit the necessary funds; specifically, three types of account are advertised, known as "Antipasto", "Pro" and "Avanzate" ("Starter", "Pro", "Advanced"), depending on the minimum deposit required and the benefits promised;

iii. on completion of the registration procedure, access is granted to the reserved area of the website https://client.alphatradeplus.com, which contains a range of functionalities, including withdrawal and deposit of liquidity on the trading account;

iv. as for traceability, the "Terms and Conditions" section of the website https://alphatradeplus.com makes generic references to "AlphaTradplus" without any indication of the latter company's registered office;

v. the contact section of the website contains, among other things, a form for requesting information and support and provides the email address support@alphatradeplus.com;

WHEREAS the activity carried out through the https://alphatradeplus.com website and relevant https://client.alphatradeplus.com webpage constitutes the provision of investment services, as referred to in article 1, paragraph 5, of the Consolidated Law on Finance, insofar as users are offered the opportunity through the aforementioned domains to open a trading account and place orders to buy and/or sell financial instruments;

WHEREAS the aforementioned activity is still ongoing and is aimed at Italian investors, given that the concerned websites were found to be available in Italian and moreover there have been reports of cold calling towards retail investors in Italy regarding the same websites;

WHEREAS "AlphaTradeplus", mentioned on this website https://alphatradeplus.com, is not authorised to provide investment services to the Italian public, since it is not listed on the register maintained by Consob pursuant to article 20 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING REGARD TO the fact that the provision of investment services and activities is reserved to authorised parties as referred to under article 18, paragraph 1, of the Consolidated Law on Finance, pursuant to which, "The professional provision of investment services and activities to the public is reserved to Italian investment firms, EU investment firms, Italian banks, EU banks and non-EU firms";

HAVING ESTABLISHED, therefore, that the operations in question qualify as the professional provision of investment services to the Italian public, in infringement of art. 18, paragraph 1 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING REGARD TO the fact that, according to the provisions of article 7-octies, letter b) of the Consolidated Law on Finance - "Powers to counteract abusive practices" - Consob "may, with regard to anyone who offers or carries out investment services or activities over the Internet without being qualified to do so pursuant to this decree: […] b) order the cessation of the infringement";

CONSIDERING it therefore necessary, in the light of the foregoing, to adopt this Resolution immediately for reasons of urgency;

RESOLVES:

To order the cessation of the infringement of article 18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/98 carried out through the https://alphatradeplus.com website and its https://client.alphatradeplus.com webpage, consisting in offering and providing investment services and activities to the Italian public.

This Resolution shall be brought to the attention of the concerned parties 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 service.

9 March 2022

THE CHAIRMAN
Paolo Savona