Hard Times Come Again No More

Disclaimer – This story has been written with the main goal of spreading awareness, scam prevention, and education. It represents real-life events, but certain details and names of the characters have been altered for the sake of anonymity. However, we did leave the actual name of the alleged scam and the fraudulent broker. 

When life becomes tough

Milly was a hard-working woman trying to give her life as best as she could. She was running her own company and raising kids but unfortunately, she hit a rough patch. Milly was married and the sad truth is that many marriages end in divorce. It seemed hers was going in that direction. Another sad truth was that divorce meant difficult times, and to top it off it got quite costly. She wanted to keep on providing for her children, she had to pay taxes for her company, and finally, divorce lawyers demanded their fees. 

Sweeping promisses take place

Handling such circumstances, Milly decided to browse the web for alternative means of income. Inquisitively she went from one site promoting cryptocurrency to another and she left it at that. Quickly enough, Mr. Jhonathan Anderson, a staff member of 365 Capital Markets, contacted her. He was very charming and witty and he made sweeping promises of making a pretty penny for Milly. She had been looking for some extra income, and Mr. Anderson was promising just that.

,,Let`s give it a go”

“Let’s give it a go”, Milly thought, and she made a deal with Mr. Anderson. She transferred €8,500 to Jhonathan, and to her amazement, she could see on the site that he was making trades in her name. More importantly, the trades were successful and quite lucrative. The display showed Milly was making money, and she was thrilled.

Instead of receiving the money, additional fees are to be paid

She could use these funds to cover her company’s costs, and when she asked to collect her money there was a twist. She had to pay the ‘de-leverage’ fees which amounted to €3,700. Mr. Anderson assured her it was all a standard procedure, and when she pays the money will be returned to her automatically. Milly thought to herself that in that case, she had nothing to lose, so she readily paid the unexpected fees. Instead of receiving her money, Milly got nothing but silence. 

No contact

Mr. Anderson stopped returning Milly’s calls and messages. What’s worse, Milly couldn’t access her funds, and the due dates for various payments were getting nearer and nearer. Though she was looking for financial help, Milly sustained a loss of €12,200 in total. 

Moral of the Story

This story explains that often victims of scams are in difficult life stages or a state of emergency. Not all defrauded individuals are motivated by greed. Yes in the case of Milly, she did want more money, but to stay afloat. Scammers will often exploit desperate people providing solutions which ultimately cause problems to grow.