Part
1
London-based
nurse Hiba Ali hoped to make some money when she opened a £250
account with a company called BinaryBook, which promised big returns
on investments known as binary options. Just months later she had
lost more than £13,000.
The day
after she opened her account most of the £250 was gone. But a phone
salesman assured her she could get it all back and more if she
invested in BinaryBook’s “risk-free platform which will give 75%
profit,” she said.
She agreed
to put £5,000 in, and over the course of high-pressure phone calls
and emails went on to invest £14,000 in total. The salesman told her
that a set of trades were “100% insured by BinaryBook bonus money
management system,” and that her money would be returned to her
account within an hour if the trades were lost.
But a few
months later she says she was told all her trades had “expired”.
While her account showed a balance of £14,689, only £689 was hers
to withdraw.
The other
£14,000 was “bonus” money and could not be accessed until she
had traded at 30 times that amount.
“I feel
stupid being fooled to this extent,” she told the Bureau. “But
they are very professional”. Ali was later left unable to work
after being hit by a car in February, and pleaded with BinaryBook
that she was desperate for money – but to no avail.
She
complained to her bank that she believed she had been defrauded and
£10,000 was refunded. But BinaryBook succcessfully disputed a
further £4,000 refund, arguing that she had not met the conditions
required to withdraw the “bonus” money. “The stress and pain
this [has] caused me is indescribable,” she said.
Ali is just
one of thousands of people who believe they have been ripped off by
companies and websites offering binary options trading – a scheme
sold as an investment opportunity that in reality is a gamble or
straight-up scam.
Binary
options investments involve betting on whether the price of certain
assets, such as shares, currencies or commodities, will go up or down
within a specific time period.
Scores of
websites like BinaryBook offer these deals to British customers, who
often forge a relationship with a personal broker – or ‘expert
trader’ – who will place the bets for them.
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