Resolution no. 22865

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 www.trade4nation.com website and the page https://client.trade4nation.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, as subsequently amended and supplemented;

HAVING REGARD to Legislative Decree no. 58 of 24 February 1998 (“Consolidated Law on Finance”), as subsequently amended and supplemented;

HAVING ESTABLISHED that, from the checks carried out, it emerged that:

1. the www.trade4nation.com website, which is also active and available in Italian, offers potential investors the opportunity to trade on the Forex market and on indices, shares, cryptocurrencies and commodities;
2. in order to place such trading transactions, users must register with the website through a procedure that is also available to users connecting from Italy and open an account on which to deposit funds; specifically, five types of accounts are advertised, depending on the minimum deposit and benefits, called “Entry", "Standard", “Premium”, “Gold” and “VIP”;
3. after registration, users may log into the reserved area at https://client.trade4nation.com, where there is a specific function to deposit funds on the trading account;
4. with regard to the legal entity that was found to operate the website in question, generic reference is made to "Trade 4Nation" on the website;

WHEREAS the activity carried out via the website www.trade4nation.com and the page https://client.trade4nation.com is deemed to constitute 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 possibility through the aforementioned domains to open a trading account on which it is possible to issue purchase and/or sale orders relating to financial instruments;

WHEREAS the aforementioned activity, carried out through the www.trade4nation.com website and its page https://client.trade4nation.com is still ongoing and is aimed at Italian investors, insofar as said domain is available in Italian and no mechanism was found to block registration by users attempting to register with the website from Italy through Italian IP addresses. Moreover, reports have been received of investment solicitation by cold calling to retail investors in Italy, and complaints have been received from Italian retail investors, who reported that they were unable to recover the sums paid for trading activities;

WHEREAS such activity carried out via the website and its related page cannot be attributed to any entity 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 licensed 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 article 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 unauthorised provision of investment services” - Consob “may, with regard to anyone who offers or carries out investment services or activities through the Internet without being qualified pursuant to this decree: […] b) order that such infringement cease”;

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 www.trade4nation.com website and the page https://client.trade4nation.com, which constitutes 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.

25 October 2023

THE CHAIRMAN
Paolo Savona