The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has charged several individuals and entities with an ongoing $283 million Ponzi scheme. A Florida court has already issues restraining orders to protect assets and documents.
According to the complaint, the defendants individually, and at times working in conjunction, made material fraudulent representations to their customers and misappropriated customer funds.
In sum, more than 2,000 customers deposited no less than $283 million in connection with the alleged fraud operated by SVG-registered firm The Traders Domain.
Individual defendants include Ted Safranko, David William Negus-Romvari, Robert Collazo Jr., Juan Jose Herman, John Fortini, Stephen Likos, Michael Shannon Sims, Holton Buggs, Alex Santi, Gabriel Beltran, and Archie Rice.
The CFTC is seeking disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, civil monetary penalties, restitution, trading and registration bans against:
- Traders Domain FX LTD. d/b/a The Traders Domain, a St. Vincent and the Grenadines company with principal operations in Canada, and its two co-founders, Fredirick Teddy Joseph Safranko, a/k/a Ted Safranko, of Ontario or British Columbia, Canada, and David William Negus-Romvari of Ontario, Canada and Mexico
- Ares Global Ltd. d/b/a Trubluefx, a Saint Lucia company
- Algo Capital LLC, a Florida company
- Algo FX Capital Advisor LLC n/k/a Quant5 Advisor LLC., a Delaware company with principal operations in Medley, Florida, and four of their officers and agents including Robert Collazo Jr. of Miami Lakes, Florida, Juan Jose Herman a/k/a/ JJ Herman of Miami, John Fortini of North Miami, Florida, and Stephen Likos of Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
- Michael Shannon Sims of Sunny Isles Beach, Florida
- Holton Buggs Jr., of Houston
- Centurion Capital Group Inc., a Florida company, and three of its officers and agents including Alejandro Santiestaban a/k/a Alex Santi, Gabriel Beltran, both of Hialeah, Florida, and Archie Rice of Fulshear, Texas
Traders Domain raised $283 million to trade XAU/USD and more
The complaint alleges that from at least November 2019 through the present, Traders Domain, along with Safranko and Negus-Romvari, orchestrated a complex scheme to solicit funds for trading leveraged or margined retail commodity transactions. These transactions primarily involved gold-to-U.S. dollar pairs (XAU/USD) and various other commodities, through both pooled and individual accounts.
According to the complaint, Traders Domain, Safranko, and Negus-Romvari made fraudulent and misleading oral and written statements, omitting key details while misappropriating customer funds. The complaint also claims that Traders Domain and Safranko falsified trading records. Moreover, Traders Domain’s successor, Trubluefx, further misappropriated customer funds by refusing to refund money, despite thousands of customers attempting to access or liquidate their accounts.
The complaint further states that Traders Domain, Safranko, and Negus-Romvari enlisted other individuals and entities (sponsors) to act on Traders Domain’s behalf. Each sponsor acted as an extension of Traders Domain’s operations.
Sponsors such as Algo Capital, Algo FX Capital Advisor (now known as Quant5), and their agents Collazo, Herman, Fortini, and Likos; Sims; Buggs; and Centurion, and its agents Santi, Beltran, and Rice, were also accused of fraudulently soliciting customers and misappropriating funds. These sponsors actively downplayed warning signs and continued to recruit customers, creating a false impression of legitimate trading as the scheme neared collapse.
In the fall of 2022, customers began facing significant delays in withdrawing funds, or were entirely unable to access their money. According to the complaint, Traders Domain, Safranko, Negus-Romvari, and the sponsor defendants offered conflicting explanations for the delays, falsely reassuring customers that their funds were secure and that withdrawals would soon be processed. Meanwhile, the sponsors continued soliciting funds from new and existing customers for trading in the Traders Domain pool, enabling the defendants to sustain their fraudulent scheme for over six months, defrauding customers out of millions of dollars.
The CFTC acknowledges the assistance provided by the National Futures Association, Ontario Securities Commission, the Financial Services Authority of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Finantsinspektsioon (the Estonian Financial Supervision and Resolution Authority), and the Vanuatu Financial Services Commission.
