Resolution no. 22362

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 carried out through the website www.ftifinance.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 www.ftifinance.com, which is active and also available in Italian, offers potential investors the opportunity to trade on the forex market and trade CFDs on, inter alia, indices and commodities;

ii. in order to place such trades, users must register with the website www.ftifinance.com, then open an account and deposit the necessary funds; specifically, four types of account are advertised, known as "Principianti", "Pro", "Trader" and "Premium" ["Beginner", "Pro", "Trader" and "Premium"], depending on the minimum deposit required and the benefits promised;

iii. as for traceability, it was not possible to identify the legal entity to which the contents of the website www.ftifinance.com are attributable;

iv. the "Contacts" section contains a form for requesting information, the e-mail address support@ftifinance.com and a telephone number with an Italian prefix;

WHEREAS the activity carried out through the website www.ftifinance.com is deemed to constitute the provision of investment services pursuant to article 1, paragraph 5, of the Consolidated Law on Finance, given that users are offered the opportunity through said domain to open a tradingaccount and place orders to buy and/or sell financial instruments;

WHEREAS the aforementioned activity is still ongoing and is aimed at Italian investors, insofar as the www.ftifinance.com site is also available in Italian, and moreover, there have been reports of cold calls being made to retail investors in Italy in relation to the said domain;

WHEREAS the activity cannot be attributed to any party that is authorised to provide investment services to the Italian public;

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 website www.ftifinance.com, constituted by the provision of 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.

15 June 2022

THE ACTING CHAIRMAN
Giuseppe Maria Berruti