“Dozens of requests and complaints” were sent to the Autorité des marchés financiers by savers who were clearly defrauded.
The Financial Markets Authority (AMF) on Friday warned against the “fraudulent offer” of the Immediate Connect site, which offers automated transactions in the currency and cryptocurrency markets, and urged the public to “be extremely vigilant”.
Immediate Connect presents itself as “the ideal solution for those who want to get rich quick” and offers to “make a million in 12-15 weeks”. It would be an “algorithmic solution (sic) for high-volume traders looking for a way to manage transactions across a range of assets”, according to its website, consulted by AFP.
Immediate Connect is described as a trading robot involved in the foreign exchange market (Forex), trading platforms for cryptoassets and derivatives of cryptoassets. It claims to be “ahead of the market by 0.01 seconds, which is incredibly fast”, and “capable of predicting trades with an accuracy level of 99.4%”.
Unauthorized companies
“Dozens of requests and complaints” were sent to the AMF by savers who were obviously defrauded, the authority lamented in a press release. She says she has taken “several actions to put an end to the actions of these unauthorized companies”.
Savers were hooked on the Internet “by an article presented as a publication by a major national daily reporting an alleged interview with a famous TV host on a program extolling the benefits of this service,” he said. In this case it is World and C8 host Cyril Hanouna, according to law firm Ziegler & Associés.
After registering online, interested savers were “contacted by a so-called financial adviser who (urged) them to register on an unauthorized trading platform to invest”, the AMF described.
Fake interviews
According to comments on the review site Trustpilot, they were harassed on the phone by foreign numbers and they were encouraged to deposit a minimum of 250 euros on the site to trigger the algorithm and the financial operations.
The promised capital gains were staggering, encouraging the saver to always invest more. Of course, it was impossible to recover the funds, according to the comments, which were particularly detailed.
The AMF reminds that only companies approved as providers of investment services in the European Union are allowed to offer brokerage services such as trading, automated or not.
“Beware of unrealistic promises from trading sites that guarantee quick profits”, emphasizes the AMF, while fraud is very numerous.