ESMA RESTRICTIONS ON RETAIL FOREX
I’m just posting this for our information.
[EDIT] ESMA's Leverage Restrictions on Retail Forex Will Have Ripple Effects
as additional perspective.
[EDIT2] Escape From Cyprus: Brokers Flee Unstable European Regulatory Regime
Apologies if this is duplication of information…
hyperscalper
no comment…
[EDIT] As many know, the FBI seized backpage DOT com alleging
s*x trafficking and other illegal activities. Here is an article on
what happens when the FBI seizes a domain… I AM JUST
OFFERING INTERESTING BACKGROUND INFO ON THE
DOMAN SEIZURE PROCESS, NOT MAKING ANY COMMENT.
[EDITfbi] Information on 1Broker.com Seizure — FBI
[EDITundercover] https://bitcoinist.com/1broker-com-domain-seized-by-the-fbi/
TIP: click to expose the comments below that article
[EDIT] “sister site” 1Fox also in jeopardy: https://cryptoinsider.com/1broker-trading-site-seizure-by-fbi-likely-to-affect-sister-site-1fox/
hyperscalper
COINBASE TO OFFER MANY MORE CRYPTO TYPES
Video by CNBC with Coinbase CEO
hyperscalper
COINEXX RECENT FAVORABLE OVERVIEW AND REVIEW
[EDIT] more reviews, with which I agree, and which I assume
are genuine, nearly all positive: Coinexx Forex Broker, Coinexx Review, Coinexx Information
hyperscalper
The CFTC wording in the 1broker case is troubling.
"The problem with Defendants’ business is that they are illegally offering offexchange,
retail commodity transactions to U.S. customers without being registered with
Plaintiff Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“Commission”), and they are failing to
implement adequate anti-money laundering and related supervisory procedures that such
registration entails. "
Federal judges have ruled that cryptocurrencies are commodities.
Is the CFTC setting a precedent with this case?
Despite the wording “at this time” in the notification above, it appears that Evolve Markets no longer meets our qualifications, and should be removed from our List. I will attend to that chore today or tomorrow.
Perhaps, just as we’ve gradually phased brokers in, we could just
put a warning that the broker is being “phased out” and that we’re watching these evolving regulatory conditions…
After all, what’s important is that we’ve identified that the brokers
cannot be seen as “soliciting” U.S. persons; but that there is no
legal prohibition to establishing an account which has not been
publicly “solicited” ?.. just a thought… This is particularly true
for brokers which are not intrusive about nationality otherwise…
Here in the U.S. with the fall of the “net neutrality” regulations
to the Republicans, most of us use VPN’s (without advertising,
I’m using NordVPN… but many others) and so an IP geolocation
serves as a “not soliciting U.S. persons” announcement to the world,
and to the would be regulators…
while we can certainly seek out the broker through increasingly
common methods such as VPN or usage of a VPS or dedicated
systems geolocated elsewhere…
I’m just saying that might be a better approach to this situation,
than list removal… which recognizes what we’ve already discussed
regarding public “solicitation” of U.S. persons…?
[EDIT] I’d suggest that we should take “at this time” … literally in
the case of Evolve.Markets as they may respond with a jurisdiction
or other alteration in business model, so we should give them some
time to do so…
[EDIT-hosts-file] Just FYI, if you make hostfile changes for
Evolve.Market for IP address 62.210.104.100 evolve.markets
…then you do NOT see the geolocation warning !! I don’t know
know enough about network routing to have an explanation…
This is from a U.S. IP address: (with the hosts file entry)
hyperscalper
REACTION TO SEIZURE OF 1BROKER
…as seen on a Twitter search… I don’t log into Twitter
myself, but do use public search… I agree with
the sentiments that this represents “overreach” and
that we as a group should strongly oppose this
trend…
[EDIT] just adding information on how 1broker’s charges
were trumped up… again, from a Twitter user…
hyperscalper
LOCALHOSTS WORKAROUNDS WHICH MAY ALLOW
ACCESS IN SOME CIRCUMSTANCES RE: 1BROKER
…just posting this as a public service… I don’t know
whether it works in all cases or not… but this avoids
access to the various DNS services which, in turn,
avoids some redirection, etc…
[…incorrect info removed…]
[MAJOR-EDIT] I removed incorrect information. Indeed, if
you are able to follow the instructions, then you can access
1broker.com from a U.S. IP address. HOWEVER… in the
case of Windows you will face a couple of minor hurdles
in changing your hosts file… Firstly, here’s a screenshot of
access to 1broker.com using the hosts modification, and then
I will explain the minor hurdles you need to jump through…
[EDIT-technical-hurdles]
I just want to explain what’s happening here. You want to
edit your “hosts” file. First of all, it has no “file extension”
so you won’t be able to use Windows notepad to edit it, as
it is fairly dumb as concerns needing a file extension. My
recommendation: get Notepad++ from this site.
https://notepad-plus-plus.org/
It is a safe, open source editor which is better in all respects
than simple Windows notepad…
Another issue is that “hosts” is considered a “system file”,
and so Windows appropriately “cloaks” this file from the
naive user. You want to change your Windows Files and
Folders view to NOT hide any system files, and also to show
all “file extensions” of all files…
Then even knowing this, you may try to navigate using
Windows Explorer to the specific location of your “hosts”
file… but find that it seems NOT to be there !! It is there,
of course, but being “hidden” from you…
The specific path to the “hosts” file, which you should open
in Notepad++ (but firstly, run Notepad++ “as administrator”)
by entering the full path:
“\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts”
That will open the file. Then follow the instructions shown
above to enter this entry on a single new line. I use a
TAB to separate the two:
“104.25.96.11 1broker.com”
that space between the two should be a TAB character,
I think… but spaces may also work.
Then you need to SAVE the file, and the system could complain
that it can’t do that since privileges may be required. Notepad++
can “reboot” itself into privileged mode, but you’ll just need
to try that…
Once you have the “hosts” file changed… Whew !!! Then
you can ping 1broker.com and you will get a ping response
from a Windows Command Prompt. More importantly, if
you enter http://1broker.com into a web browser like Firefox,
you will get through to the image above, which I posted,
EVEN from a U.S. originating IP address…
Sorry this seems complex but, hey, you learned a little bit
about the local hosts file on your Windows system; and of
course the same technique would work on Linux, etc…
[EDIT] unless you make this change in your “hosts” file,
you will be unable to use a browser. If you enter
http://104.25.96.11
in the absence of making a change to the hosts file,
then you will get a malformed http request related error,
and CloudFlare will popup a page which will completely
confuse you… You must make the change in your local
hosts file, and then it should work !.. Geez ! lol 
[EDIT-final] Please don’t mess up your local hosts file…
Get some help if you have any doubts…
[EDIT-one-more] Here are some entries you may wish
to make in your hosts files, as I did:
104.25.96.11 1broker.com
62.210.104.100 evolve.markets
185.67.45.77 coinexx.com
64.91.238.205 finprotrading.com
104.25.96.11 1fox.com
112.196.28.196 turnkeyforex.com
hyperscalper
im afraid every broker on our list will be target sooner or later.
i just notice this statement at the bottom of coinexx home page
" The website www.coinexx.com is operated by Coinexx Inc with registered address at First Floor, First St Vincent Bank Ltd Building, James Street, Kingstown, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
This website is not directed at any jurisdiction and is not intended for any use that would be contrary to local law or regulation.
Risk Warning: Trading leveraged products such as Forex and CFDs may not be suitable for all investors as they carry a high degree of risk to your investment. Before deciding to trade any such leveraged products you should carefully consider your investment objectives, level of experience, and risk appetite, and if necessary seek independent advice to full understand the risk involved Risk Disclosure."
Maybe it is time for some of us to pool resources and create an offshore company together.
Cryptocurrency lets us transfer funds. If we were all on the board of directors of an offshore entity, would it be legal for offshore brokers to open accounts with the entity? Or would we still need to be protected from accessing and using our own money?
I don’t have the legal skills to navigate these waters. I am a techie. But, at some point this might make sense to do.
1broker had a disclaimer and it didn’t help them.
i see that and makes me mad that the u.s. goverment is going after these brokers
SIMPLEFX ATTEMPT TO ADD ACCOUNT
I have an existing BTC account at SimpleFX, and did not initially
receive the geolocation error. However, when I attempted
to ADD a new USD account, and at the point when I
truthfully stated United States, then there was
an immediate block against the new account creation…
Of course we want to be truthful… lol 
hyperscalper
I would like to see some clearly defined rules that make sense.
1broker had a great platform. As far as I know, there was just one really good programmer
who made an innovative trading platform. If he ran afoul of some regulations, maybe he gets
fined and can go back into business.
Most of us regular folks don’t want the bad guys to be able to launder money.
But, you have to allow innovation and allow for people to use the fruits of their labor as they see fit.
I’m hoping for some sensible rules that also allow a competitive and innovative market place.
It makes me mad too. They have my money!
I’m trying to keep an open mind and to allow the authorities to do their job. I’m not happy with the current climate, but I’m also not an anarchist. There is a job for regulatory bodies to do, specifically keeping all the players honest.
But, they have been stifling competition and shrinking the market for years.
I’m not happy with what I’ve been seeing.
It hurts the small traders the most.
If I had 10 million I would still be trading like I was a decade ago with a Swiss regulated broker. Unfortunately, I don’t!
AMERICANS OWN “DOT COM” AND SO THEY
CAN EASILY INTERFERE
…as read on Reddit
This means that 1broker.whatever would be a better
or safer domain name to use…
[EDIT] Official updates for 1broker situation appear here:
https://1pool.ltd/
by the 1broker organization…
hyperscalper
It’s a creative idea, but a different DNS name wouldn’t have helped.
They seized the site and disabled withdrawals.
DISCUSSION OF THE VARIOUS U.S. AGENCIES
AND VARIOUS EXISTING EXCHANGES
I was not suggesting earlier that U.S. domain “control” over “dot com”
was a substantial part of the 1broker issue. Keep tabs on their
official status at: http://1pool.ltd
hyperscalper
I’ve heard similar on Twitter all weekend.
The wording in the CFTC case might set a precedent. If 1broker didn’t do anything we would normally think of as illegal and only gets convicted of providing services to US clients, it might be bad news for several other brokers.
I’m wracking my brain to try and figure out what to do next. For all the regulation we have in the US, the brokers here get mostly lukewarm ratings for technical performance.
Plus, with 50:1 leverage you’d better have some solid starting capital to make any money in a human lifetime.
Is the CFTC about to go raiding and pillaging other brokers?
Is it time to drop all crypto into cold wallets?
It’s hard to say. We should watch how this case develops closely.
I am rooting for 1broker to resume operations after a fine and some anti-money laundering protections, but I’m not holding my breath.
