Erscheinung:08.01.2024 | Topic Unauthorised business, Consumer protection Identity fraud: BaFin warns consumers about the websites freedominvestment.us and freedominvestment.de
The Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) warns consumers about the websites freedominvestment.us and freedominvestment.de and the services they are offering. According to information available to BaFin, the unknown operator is providing financial and investment services on these websites without the required authorisation. The operator refers to itself using the names Freedom Investments, FIT, FIT Freedom Investments Inc. German Branch, X-Trade Brokers, FIT S.A. and FIT Financial Services Inc. On the website freedominvestment.us, the operator claims to be supervised by BaFin. This is not the case.
The operator has listed various business addresses on its websites and in communications with customers, including two locations in the United States as well as one address each in London, United Kingdom, Diekirch, Luxembourg, and Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
On the website freedominvestment.us, the operator also lists a commercial register number from the Frankfurt am Main Local Court (Amtsgericht). This number and the Frankfurt address actually belong to XTB S.A. German Branch, which is a branch of a Polish investment firm registered with BaFin. There is no business relationship between XTB S.A. German Branch and the website operator or any of the offers they are making. This is a case of identity fraud.
The Berlin-based company Freedom Finance Germany GmbH, a tied agent of the Cypriot company Freedom Finance Europe Limited, also has nothing to do with the business activities conducted on these websites. Similarly, there is no connection to the New York-based company Freedom Investments, Corp, which is registered with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It has to be assumed that this is a case of identity theft.
Anyone conducting banking business or providing financial or investment services in Germany may do so only with authorisation from BaFin. However, some companies offer these services without the necessary authorisation. Information on whether a particular company has been granted authorisation by BaFin can be found in BaFin’s database of companies.
The information provided by BaFin is based on section 37 (4) of the German Banking Act (Kreditwesengesetz – KWG).
Please be aware:
BaFin, the German Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt – BKA) and the German state criminal police offices (Landeskriminalämter) recommend that consumers seeking to invest money online should exercise the utmost caution and do the necessary research beforehand in order to identify fraud attempts at an early stage.
