FX week in review: Plus500 in Estonia, CEO/COO changes at INFINOX, Zenfinex, Barracuda FX, Samtrade scammers

Gerald Segal 0 Comments February 20, 2022

Who did Plus500 hire (ex Admirals, Coop Pank SA) to head a new operation in Estonia?

Who is INFINOX’s new COO?

Who did Zenfinex hire (ex FXCM) as CEO MENA?

How are scammers attempting to rip off former clients of Samtrade FX?

Answers to these questions, and a whole lot more, appeared first or exclusively this past week at FNG. Some of the most read and commented-on FX industry news stories to appear over the past seven days on FNG included:

Exclusive: Plus500 hires ex Admirals compliance head Sigrid Aljas as CEO of new Estonia arm. FNG Exclusive… FNG has learned that leading global CFDs broker Plus500 has established a new entity in Estonia, and has hired two local senior executives to head the operation. The company set up Plus500EE AS to operate as an investment firm, and it received a regulatory licensed from Estonia’s financial regulator, Finantsinspektsioon, earlier this month. Heading the operation are two experienced Estonia based executives, Sigrid Aljas and Kerli Lõhmus. Sigrid Aljas worked at Admiral Markets AS, which operates the Admirals retail forex business, from 2019-2021, most recently as the company’s Head of Compliance. She has also worked at Veriff, Swedbank Estonia, and from 2014-2016 at Finantsinspektsioon in the Business Conduct Supervision Division.

Samtrade FX administrators warn of scammers impersonating the company. The interim judicial managers for embattled offshore Retail FX broker Samtrade FX have issued a statement that there are parties posing as employees of Samtrade, or falsely claiming to be representatives of Samtrade, reaching out to investors on matters relating to the company. The administrators stated that these scammers have offered to help former Samtrade clients with, amongst other things, withdrawal requests, password resets and other account security related matters. The preying on Samtrade FX clients comes as those clients are awaiting word on when (if ever) they will be able to recoup the money they had invested at the company.

NAGA sets crypto platform NAGAX launch date, January revenues €8 million. After reporting a relatively slow Q4-2021 with revenues (of €14.1 million) down 22%, social trading focused broker NAGA Group AG reported that revenues for the first month of 2022 came in strong, at around €8 million. NAGA Group, which operates the CySEC-licensed NAGA.com online trading brand, announced the launch date of its crypto exchange NAGAX – March 7, 2022. NAGAX is planned to be a brand-new social trading platform focused on cryptocurrencies. It will launch with a crypto wallet, as well as a crypto exchange with more than 50 assets. Shortly after the launch of NAGAX, NAGA will release its NFT as well as Staking platform under the label “NAGA Earn”.

Tickmill launches CFDs on futures products from Crypto.com’s Small Exchange. FCA licensed Retail FX and CFDs broker Tickmill has announced the launch of new direct market access CFDs based on futures products from The Small Exchange, owned by Crypto.com. Clients at Tickmill are now able to trade new CFDs of futures products like Small Cannabis, Small Cryptocurrency, Small 2YR US Treasury Yield, and many more. The broker released the information in an article informing clients that, thanks to their partnership with the US-based futures exchange, their aim to democratize futures has developed further by increasing accessibility to retail traders.