Resolution no. 23180

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 https://cmfxtrade.com and its page https://client.cmfxtrade.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 checks on the web, it emerged that:

i. the https://cmfxtrade.com website – which is active and searchable in Italian – offers potential investors the possibility of trading Forex, shares, indices and CFDs;

ii. to carry out the transactions, users must register with the https://cmfxtrade.com website, following a procedure that is also available to users connected from Italy, and open a trading account. After registering, users can access the reserved area of the website at https://client.cmfxtrade.com, where they can, among other things, deposit funds on the account and access the trading platform;

iii. as to traceability, in the contractual terms available on the website, reference is made to "Capital Markets" and at the bottom of the website pages, references are made to "CM FXTrade" and only a mailbox is indicatedsupport@cmfxtrade.com.

WHEREAS the activity carried out via the https://cmfxtrade.com website and its https://client.cmfxtrade.com page 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 above activity, carried out via the https://cmfxtrade.com website and its https://client.cmfxtrade.com page, is still ongoing and is aimed at Italian investors, given that said website is available in Italian, the absence of a mechanism to block registration by users attempting to register with the said website from Italy through Italian IP addresses has been noted and attempts to contact Italian investors have been reported, to whom, in one case, an investment agreement was submitted in Italian to operate through the https://cmfxtrade.com website. In the complaints received from Italian investors, it is reported that the complaining parties were unable to get back the sums deposited for trading transactions;

WHEREAS the https://cmfxtrade.com website and its page https://client.cmfxtrade.com may not be attributed to any entity 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 commercial 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 activities in question qualify as the professional provision of investment services to the Italian public, in breach of Article 18, paragraph 1 of the Consolidated Law on Finance;

HAVING REGARD to the provisions of Article 7-octies, letter b) of the Consolidated Law on Finance - "Powers to counteract unauthorised provision of investment services" - pursuant to which 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 that the 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 breach of article 18 of Legislative Decree no. 58/98 conducted via the https://cmfxtrade.com website and its https://client.cmfxtrade.com page, constituted by the offer and 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.

26 June 2024

THE CHAIRMAN
Paolo Savona