Page 25 - 期货和衍生品行业监管动态（2025年2月刊）

期货和衍生品行业监管动态

The order stems from the CFTC’s complaint, filed Aug. 12, 2019, charging

defendants with fraud and other violations. [See CFTC Press Release No. 7995-19]

Case Background

The order finds that from March 26, 2014, until the filing of the complaint on

Aug. 12, 2019, the defendants made numerous fraudulent misrepresentations to

customers on websites and through email and telephone solicitations, telling

customers that binary option transactions were profitable, when in fact the substantial

majority of their customers lost money, and individual brokers misrepresented their

names, financial expertise, and physical location. The order finds the defendants

misappropriated customer funds and made additional misrepresentations to thwart

customers’ attempts to withdraw their funds, including failing to disclose material

information about so-called “bonuses” and “risk-free trades.” The defendants also

manipulated their trading platform’s risk settings to limit or prevent customers from

being “in the money” with winning trades.

Previous Settlement

The court previously entered a consent order against another defendant involved

in the fraud, Yakov Cohen, which resolved similar allegations against Cohen and

required that he disgorge $7 million in ill-gotten gains received from his participation

in the fraudulent binary options scheme. [See CFTC Press Release 8962-24]

Parallel Criminal Actions

On Aug. 7, 2019, Elbaz was convicted by a federal jury of wire fraud and

conspiracy to commit wire fraud in violation of criminal statutes based upon

substantially the same underlying facts as alleged in the CFTC complaint, she was

sentenced to 20 years in prison, and ordered to pay restitution of $28 million inUnited

States v. Elbaz, No. 18-cr-00157 (D. Md.)

Cohen pled guilty to a charge of conspiracy to commit wire fraud predicated on

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