Resolution no. 20555

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 thewww.tradebnp.com website

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

ACCORDING TO Law no. 216 of June 7th, 1974, and subsequent amendments and additions;

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

HAVING DISCOVERED , after verification of the www.tradebnp.com website, that:

i. The www.tradebnp.com website is available in Italian, and registered by a user whose identity is unknown;

ii. potential investors, after registering on the websites and opening an account using the online form, have the opportunity of trading on the currency market (FOREX) and in CFDs on various assets, including shares, raw materials, precious metals and cryptocurrencies using the MT4 platform;

iii. a monetary investment is required to carry out the trading transactions, and payments are made into the online account. This website offers several types of accounts, 'Normal', 'Intermediate', 'Initial', 'Advanced' and 'Superior', that differ mainly for the minimum required deposit and the benefits.

iv. In the section entitled "Our company", the company "TradeBNP" is mentioned in generic terms, without any indication of the address of the registered office;

v. in the section entitled 'Contacts', the address '43 Franklin St, Belfast BT2, UK' can be found, but the company to which it refers is not specified;

CONSIDERING that the activities carried out via the above mentioned website can be classified investment services as referred to in Art. 1, par. 5, of the Consolidated Law on Finance, insofar as the clients have the opportunity of opening a trading account with which the purchase and/or sale orders for financial instruments can be issued;

CONSIDERING that the aforementioned operations performed on the www.tradebnp.com, website are directed towards Italian investors, insofar as the website is also available in Italian and there is no mechanism to prevent the registration of Italian users;

CONSIDERING that TradeBNP is not authorised to provide investment services to the Italian public, insofar as it is not registered on the register managed by CONSOB pursuant to Art. 20 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

GIVEN that the provision of investment services and activities is reserved to authorised entities 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 to investment firms and banks';

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

GIVEN 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 on Internet without being qualified according to this decree: a) make the circumstance that the party is not authorised to carry out the activity indicated by article 1, paragraph 5 public, for precautionary measures,; b) order the termination of the infringement';

HEREBY RESOLVES:

To order the termination of the infringement of Art .18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/1998 also performed by the www.tradebnp.com website, consisting in the provision of investment services and activities to the Italian public.

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

An appeal may be made against this measure to the Regional Administrative Court of Lazio within 60 days of the notification date.

August 2, 2018

On behalf of THE CHAIRMAN
Anna Genovese