British Virgin Islands BVI Financial Fraud Investigations.
This article is intended to provide insight into British Virgin Islands BVI financial fraud investigations and a useful guide to financial investors and potential investors in order to help them avoid the Internet scams, the financial scams, the cold calling, the boiler rooms and the financial frauds in the BVI (British Virgin Islands).
The content of such article is based upon real British Virgin Islands BVI financial fraud investigations done by ISOG, including Brentwood International Group Ltd, Lucent Group International Ltd, Firstprime International Ltd, First Prime Group Ltd, First Prime Asia Ltd, BSD Associates Ltd, Stanswood International LLC, Pacific Wealth Global Ltd, Domino Securities International, Montgomery Blake & Associates, Taicomex, Blueridge Horizon Corp., Frizbrenner Alliance Corp., Stanford Alliance Corp and many others.
Country of Incorporation
Many of the companies involved in cold calling, boiler rooms, internet scams, financial scams and frauds are incorporated in the BVI (British Virgin Islands), Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
These countries offer the possibilities to incorporate anonymous offshore companies. This means that if you want to know the names of the people you are dealing with, you cannot. The real beneficiaries of the company are protected by anonymity and therefore, even in case of fraud, it will be very difficult to get a court order to disclose their names.
License
To be able to offer financial services and operate as a broker, a company has to hold a license in each country where it promotes its services. These licenses are issued by the Financial Supervisory Commission of each and single country.
Usually, the people operating the company tell you they have a license in their country of incorporation. This is most of the time a lie. In fact, an offshore company cannot operate in the country of incorporation and therefore they cannot hold a license in that country.
Moreover, as already outlined, if the broker does not have a license in the country of residence of the prospect, this broker is operating illegally and you should report it to the Financial Supervisory Authority of your country.
Website and Contact Information
Check the broker’s website to see if they provide a physical address and a telephone number.
If they provide a PO Box, then you know something is wrong. If they provide a physical address, then check on the web to see whether other companies are registered at the same address. For example, companies incorporated in the BVI always give the same address which is the address of the resident agent, meaning the law firm that incorporated the company. The broker itself is not at that address.
The address is a very good indication because a company that pretend to offer financial services in your country must have a local office and address since they need a license from your local Financial Supervisory Authority.
Very often these alleged brokers use internet (IP) telephone numbers in this way you cannot trace them easily and without a court order in the country where they have the IP telephony contract.
Personal Meeting
Selling financial services requires providing the client with a lot of information about the investment and this is done in a personal meeting between the broker and the client.
The companies involved in scams and financial frauds will never give you a chance to meet them in person. Sometimes they claim this opportunity is offered only to top clients.
Payment
These fraudulent companies usually never require you to transfer your money to them directly. They provide you with a payment instruction where you are requested to transfer money to a third company whose bank account is in a country which is neither your country of residence nor their country of incorporation.
Check the country where you are supposed to transfer your money and you will see that it is likely to be Malaysia, Seychelles, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Indonesia, Panama among others.
Taxes
Many of such fraudulent brokers, after having taken your money, tell you that in order for you to disinvest and get your money back, you need to pay a 30% tax to IRS (the US Tax Office) or give this in deposit until IRS itself allows you to get it back. This is just another way to get more money from you.
The financial frauds in the BVI (British Virgin Islands) are among the more difficult to investigate.
ISOG private investigators and private detectives are expert in British Virgin Islands BVI financial fraud investigations.