Colmex24 review –Five Things You Should Know About Colmex24.com
Colmex24 is an example of a very brazen type of scam – the creation of clone websites of legitimate companies. Colmex24 illegally uses the name of a genuine broker – Colmex Pro – in order to deceive inexperienced people and cheat them out of their money.
Colmex24 is an example of why we should always verify the claims we see on the internet and not accept anything at face value.
COLMEX24 REGULATION AND SAFETY OF FUNDS
Colmex24 is presented as a trademark of the Cyprus-based broker Colmex Pro Ltd.
However, a check of the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) database shows that Colmex24 is not among the authorised domains used by this broker:
In fact, on the regulator’s website we find an explicit warning about the Colmex24 website:
Colmex24 lists a contact address in London, United Kingdom. The Cypriot company is indeed authorised to offer financial services in the UK as well, but as we have seen, the Colmex24 website is not among the domains used by this legitimate broker.
No Terms and Conditions, Customer Agreement or any legal documentation such as is required of any broker can be found on the Colmex24 website.
When choosing a broker through which to invest in the financial markets, you should not only make sure that all the information required by law is available, but also that this information is true. Always check that the company is indeed on the records of the specified regulator and that the domain used is among those officially approved for the particular broker.
You should only trust your money to companies that you can confirm are licensed by regulators such as CySEC or Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK. As their customer you will enjoy a number of guarantees including negative balance protection and guarantee for your funds if the broker goes bankrupt, which goes up to EUR 20,000 in EU and 85,000 GBP in the UK. Regulations in the UK and EU include some important measures designed to improve investor protection and promote market integrity and transparency, such as transaction reporting. Regulated brokers are also required to segregate their operational funds from the client’s money.
COLMEX24 TRADING SOFTWARE
The Colmex24 website mentions the most popular trading software among brokers, MetaTrader 4 (MT4). However, there are no links to download the platform anywhere.
Although the website is available in English-German, the registration form and the client portal are only available in German.
When registering an account, we see a link to a supposed web trader. However, after logging into the client portal, we see that the web trader in question consists only of charts and graphs with current asset and index prices, with no order placement function.
This is the cheapest and laziest way to mimic the presence of a trading platform. Despite its efforts to impersonate a real broker, Colmex24 clearly relies on fooling mainly people without any experience and knowledge of financial trading.
There are more than enough licensed brokers offering clients the MT4 experience and/or the newer version of the software MT5. These platforms have established themselves as industry standard because they offer a wide range of features, including a variety of options for customization, multiple account usage, designing and implementing custom scripts for automated trading and backtesting trade strategies.
COLMEX24 TRADING CONDITIONS
There is no clear and systematic description of trading conditions on the Colmex24 website. Nowhere are basic parameters such as leverage and spread mentioned. Instead, there are confusing and contradictory descriptions of different “trading plans” and associated commissions.
Trading plans for forex trading have a minimum deposit of 2,000 USD and for equity trading – 3,000 USD. Genuine brokers do not differentiate between trading account types on such parameters. Most legitimate brokers also have much lower minimum deposits. More and more companies are allowing the creation of micro accounts with 100 USD or even less.
The commissions listed on the Colmex24 website are extremely high – for the “Basic” plan, a fee of 14.5 USD per contract per side is listed for the currency trading. This means that for a single transaction, the trader will have to pay 29 USD. With real brokers, the trader can expect to pay less than 20 USD, and that for a traded Lot, not for a single transaction. Furthermore, it is not clear whether this commission is in addition to the spread.
Colmex24 claims to offer a swap-free option for Islamic accounts. With such an account, however, there is an additional commission on top of the above fees – 2 pips for major currency pairs and 4 pips for “exotic” ones. Given that 2 pips is itself a spread that exceeds industry averages, Colmex24 ‘s terms are beyond unfavourable.
In addition, the Colmex24 website describes a number of additional fees that do not exist with legitimate brokers. These include, for example, the “Corporate Action Fees” of 5 USD. According to the description given on the website, a client is also required to pay a dividend if he maintains a short position in a company’s stock.
Scammers like Colmex24 don’t really invest their clients’ money. Such strange terms and conditions are designed to confuse people and block any attempts to withdraw funds.
COLMEX24 DEPOSIT/WITHDRAW METHODS AND FEES
At the time of writing this review, Colmex24 does not have a menu for depositing funds. It is possible that scammers are prompting their victims to make direct contact with them so they can direct them to some shady payment method.
Legitimate brokers typically offer clients a wide choice of transparent payment methods, including bank transfer, credit/debit cards and established e-wallets such as PayPal, Skrill or Neteller.
The only payment method mentioned at all on the website is bank transfer. Colmex24 claims that it does not charge fees for bank transfer deposits, and for withdrawals of less than 500 USD. For higher amounts, the withdrawal fee is 40 USD or 30 EUR.
There is also a fee for accounts inactive for more than 30 days. This fee is monthly and varies between 30 USD and 55 USD depending on the type of account.
HOW DOES THE SCAM WORK
Many people have a desire to invest in the financial markets but lack the necessary knowledge and experience. This makes them a potential victim of the many internet scammers posing as brokers and investment intermediaries. These types of scams have exploded alongside the cryptocurrency boom.
If you trust such a website and give them your personal information, you will be contacted by experienced scammers who will entice you with promises of easy profits. The scammers usually offer to take over all aspects of investing for you, sometimes even prompting you to install remote access software on your personal computer. After investing an initial low amount, they will convince you that you are already making incredible profits and urge you to invest more.
But you will never get the promised profits, nor will you be able to get your money back. If you want to withdraw funds from your account, you will find that you have suddenly lost everything in the market, or that you have to meet impossibly high traded volume requirements, or that you have to pay huge fees. It is also possible that fraudsters simply disappear because they hide behind fake names and shell companies in offshore areas that are not subject to any control and regulation.
WHAT TO DO WHEN SCAMMED
One of the few options to get at least some of your money back in such a situation is to ask for a chargeback. But this is only possible if you have used a credit or debit card for the transaction. Scammers typically use cryptocurrencies or dubious e-wallets that make it impossible to get your money back.
Under no circumstances should you trust people and websites that promise to magically refund your lost money for an upfront fee. This is also a well established scam. You may even fall victim to the same scammers again.
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