Tag: Capital Letter

The Russian-controlled high-risk payment processor Payeer has been on our radar since 2021. Since then, the operating companies behind the payment facilitator have changed several times. We have also discovered Payeer to be a facilitator of scams during this time. Currently, Payeer is one of the payment facilitators for the (interconnected) offshore broker schemes Pocket Option and PO Trade, alongside Advcash and Perfect Money. Here is our latest update.

FinTelegram has reported several times about crypto payment processor Payeer which is controlled by Russian nationals. We have already discovered Payeer as a payment processor in scams several times. The Estonian FIU announced that Payeer had lost its license. The Estonian FIU exposed deficiencies, and the license would have been invalidated. However, Payeer decided to renounce their license to avoid the revocation. Now, the scheme operates with a crypto license in Lithuania!

It is indeed a huge scam network. Scams will typically either take offshore companies or simply invent fake companies. Only rarely, they are operated by companies in Europe as is the case with the Capital Letter scam network. Capital Letter GmbH, registered in Munich, Germany was the operator of several large scams until the end of 2020. In addition, two other companies also registered in Germany, Brunnlitz GmbH and Tokkata Software GmbH, participated in the scams. All three companies are operated by Ukrainian individuals; all received warnings from regulators.

Fincana OÜ, a crypto payment processor, licensed in Estonia by the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) as the competent regulator, operates the payment processor Payeer (www.payeer.com) together with Paycorp Limited, which is registered in Vanuatu and licensed by the VFSC. This payment processor has increasingly appeared as a scam facilitator over the last couple of months. For example, in the scams of the Capital Letter group against which regulators issued numerous warnings. The beneficial owner of Payeer is the Russian Liubov Svezhentseva.

Against the German Capital Letter GmbH and its network of offshore entities and scams such as BrightFinance, SolidInvest, GFXRoyal, STSRoyal, STSCrypto, or GFXFinance, various European regulators such as the UK FCA (here), BaFin (here), or the FMA (here) have already warned and issued Cease and Desist Orders over the last months. The Italian Consob has ordered a blackout of the sites (here). However, the scammers are unimpressed. Some scams are still active. Now the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) issued a new warning.

Early this week, the Italian regulator Consob has ordered the black-out of five new websites offering financial services illegally. The regulator has the authority to order the black-out of websites that illegally offer financial services to Italian consumers. Thus Consob can order internet service providers to block access from Italy to websites offering financial services without the proper authorization.

On September 29 and 30, 2020, the German Financial Market Authority BaFin issued several Cease and Desist Orders against German companies that provide payment processing services without the appropriate authorization. The BaFin order against the German companies is related to the international broker scams GiroFX, STSRoyal, and Fibonatex against which other regulators have already issued warnings.