The CFTC has issued a press-release confirming iMarketsLive and Wealth Generators were ‘illegally offering forex and binary options to retail investors in the United States‘. According to the CFTC, both MLM companies failed to register their respective offering, making the businesses illegal. Interestingly, both the orders were issued on September 14th.

The company’s FX Signals Live product caught CFTC’s attention. Through FX Signals Live, iMarketsLive affiliates were able to receive an automated ROI through forex trading.

The official report said:

“The individual customers did not take any actions to make the forex trades occur and did not exercise any discretion with respect to the trades in their accounts. Approximately 500 customers automatically mirrored trades in their forex accounts that were posted on IML’s website.”

Dig further into iMarketsLive’s past, and you’ll soon find some uncomfortable facts. The company has been banned from offering financial services and products in Belgium and has been the subject of warnings by France and Spain, according to a release from the Financial Services and Markets Authority, Belgium’s financial regulator, which says,

“The system proposed by International Markets Live exhibits features characteristic of a pyramid scheme.”

Rather than defend themselves to prove they weren’t breaking the law, iMarketsLive has settled with the CFTC. The settlement order sees iMarketsLive agree that the CFTC’s assertion they broke the law is “taken as true and correct”. iMarketsLive will also have to pay a $150,000 fine plus interest within ten days of the order (September 14th).

With regard to Wealth Generators, the CFTC’s order substantially resembles that of iMarketsLive. The CFTC investigated and found Wealth Generators was violating the Commodity Exchange Act by illegally offering trading advice regarding retail forex transactions and binary options to some of Respondent’s paid customers who were not eligible contract participants.

As with iMarketsLive, rather than defend themselves to prove they weren’t breaking the law, Wealth Generators settled for $150,000.