FX trader gets prison sentence for fraudulent scheme Lucrative Pips
The Department of Justice (DOJ) has confirmed that Kevin Perry, a Forex trader behind fraudulent scheme Lucrative Pips, has been sentenced to prison.
Perry’s investment fraud started when he was a teenager and resulted in more than $430,000 in losses to investors. The scam has resulted in a prison sentence of 41 months in federal prison for Perry.
“Perry carelessly continued his fraudulent investments even after a civil complaint was filed against him, thinking he was untouchable”, said Chris Hacker, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta. “Hopefully, this sentence sends a message that the FBI will find criminals who greedily prey on investors, no matter how clever they believe their scheme to be.”
Kevin Perry led investors to believe that his investment company, Lucrative Pips, was successfully earning substantial profits by investing in the Forex market. He induced investors to send money by signing agreements that claimed the investors’ initial investments were secure from loss.
In reality, however, Lucrative Pips was never registered as a commodity pool operator with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC.) Also, Perry had never generated the historical returns represented to investors. Instead, he was using investor money to enrich himself or to pay off other investors, with the goal of enticing others to invest with him.
Even after the CFTC filed a civil complaint against Perry, he continued to make fraudulent investment pitches to potential investors. He even falsely promised an undercover FBI agent that an investment of $10,000 would return a profit of $19,000 to $25,000 per month.
On top of the prison sentence, Perry will have to pay $438,799 in restitution and a special assessment of $100.