So, I answered an advert by 4xEx apparently endorsed by Elon Musk to invest in cryptocurrency. I deposited £250 and was assigned a manager, Axel. He said he was going to teach me everything I needed to know. I was really worried and apprehensive as Axel opened some small trades without really showing me what he was doing.
Axel said I would need to invest more money to make it mutually beneficial. What he said made sense as it's all about %s. Axel made some small trades on Forex in my account. He put a lot of pressure on me to take out a loan to the maximum amount I could borrow.
I agreed to put in a further £1k of my savings and consider taking out the loan later depending on how things went. Axel agreed and said he would trade using the £1k and if I wasn't happy we could part friends. I was happy with this and assumed we would trade with this amount for a while whilst I built my confidence. Using any desk, he helped me set up a Chase Bank account and a Coinpass account. I deposited the £1k into Coinpass via Chase. However, Coinpass put a 30 day block on my account meaning I couldn't transfer it to 4xEx. Axel said to prevent further delay, he would match it with company money until Coinpass released it. I had to sign a contract. When I asked about some of the wording Axel said It didn't apply as I wouldn't be trading with it, it would only be him. He said that because we were now trading with a larger amount we could move to the commodities market. He made two trades in gold over the next few days which made decent profits of $80 and $98. Happy days! He walked me through removing a trial $50 to Coinpass. I had to sign an email and the money duly arrived. Axel said that he'd proved his point and that I now needed to take out a loan. He said that he was a senior account manager, very experienced and that a small amount like this wasn't worth his time. He said that the company had a co financing programme for certain clients, where they would match an individuals investment for a limited amount of time. Axel said I qualified and by doing this and borrowing money to trade with, he'd be able to grow my account, pay back the loan and company money and I'd be able to trade with the resulting profit. It made sense but at the end of the day, he was just a voice at the end of the phone who could disappear at any moment. I was very torn as I could see an opportunity here but also couldn't risk going into debt for 5 years. Even so, before I knew it, I had applied for an £8k loan. During the process I had searched the internet for information on 4xEx. There were a few negative Trustpilot reviews but I reasoned that there would be a lot more if it was a complete scam. Then I read a review where the guy had made the token $50 withdrawal but couldn't remove any more of his money. I decided to test it and see if I could withdraw $450. Unlike the first time, no email arrived for signature. I tried again over the weekend but could not make the withdrawal. My confidence was shattered. I repaid the £8k loan in full. When I told Axel what I had done, he wasn't happy. He was very dismissive saying he only wanted to work with serious people. He wanted me to move my £1k from Coinpass to another platform to transfer to 4xEx as he said this is what the contract said. I refused. I said he could have the money that was in the 4xEx account as I was walking away. He then said I'd be hearing from their lawyers but I didn't.
I wrote a factual Trustpilot review and Axel called. He wanted me to remove it. He said he'd pay the 1k to the company himself which I didn't understand as their money was still in the 4xEx account
He transferred me to another manager, Aldo, who was very helpful at first and aided me in transferring out most of the initial deposit and profit to my Coinpass account and then to Chase where I could access it. He asked me what had gone wrong with Axel and I explained it was the pressure to borrow money and the not being able to withdraw funds that I wasn't happy with. We spoke and I can't believe I did this, but I agreed to work with him with an initial £500 which we deposited via Ibinex.
I was beginning to build a good relationship with Aldo, he was very patient explaining how things worked but then my beloved horse had a horrible accident. I told Aldo and that I would need my £500 back towards the vet bill. She'd need a lot of my attention so I'd look into trading again later when I had more time. He said not to worry, he'd help me to get my money out... but he didn't. He arranged calls which never came. His promises came to nothing. Eventually he told me I had to make more trades to increase my volume before the company would allow a withdrawal, I refused and we have stalemate. I continue to post reviews.
UPDATE
Finally the company have released my money. It took almost 2 months of arguing and posting negative reviews but eventually I have got most of it back