Ok cool. Thanks for shedding that light. It sounds reasonable. I thought the way he's been throwing directional traders under the bus, and then pitching the spread as a slick easy approach, it kinda threw up some red flags for me. No biggie.
Cite the NFA or CFTC or SEC rules that I am violating. I have never handled consulting client funds as trading or risk funds. I do not publish or distribute trading signals or trade recommendations to my clients. I do not tell my clients what to buy or sell. I have no give-up agreements or introducing broker arrangements. I take no vig or commissions of any type or kind. Since I have been doing client work and sponsoring on ET for about five years now, produce the proof from an actual client that I have somehow ripped him off or defrauded him or violated our consulting contract. Otherwise, you are just a slanderous troll living in his mother's basement talking about the good old days at REFCO.
No one ever said you were defrauding. It was stated that it sucks being defrauded. People are naturally skeptical. And this is your chance to answer questions about your services. And that is good that you have over 100 ET customers. Now a serious question, if someone wanted to talk to them what would they do? The reason I am asking is because it seems as though many questions have been dodged. JTrader33 has been politely asking questions. I'm being civil here and trying to get your thread moving on toward some productivity.
as a former series 3 holder, you don't necessarily need to give trading signals or hold ciient money to be obligated to be registered with the NFA. let me tell you that you are on the borderline bc traders are coming to you to learn how to make money on the basis that you claim to trade in certain market and make money yourself, and that people are paying you to have access to your strategies and IP rights....yet the problem is i noticed that one of the strategies you claim to trade doesn't exist. If this problem is not clearly illustrated then anyone who pays you deserves to feel like the course was overvalued after the fact. Moreover, you claimed to make 500k on the gas oil crack - ok this is possible in a good market. however, the way gas oil trades, i dont beleive that to be true unless you took some huge bets and got lucky.......that is 10% on 5mill... that is 2000 usd a day consistently or catching big moves. Not even pierre andurand can do that. the gas oil crack is an exchange traded spread, basically it trades as its own product, you are teaching people how to make money on the gasoil crack? imagine if i said, learn how to make money trading outright wti oil with my strategies..........whether its outright or spreads - you need to be careful how you market yourself...bc its no difference..... if you look at the nfa rulebook, you have to be registered as a cta if you give investment advice. what you are doing is ambigous and i would gather that after an nfa investigation, they would make you get registered for the exorbitant fee that you charge. then once you have to adhere to their rulebook, you will realize that you will not be allowed to make the claims that you have bc some of it is simply not true. you are trying to get around this by saying someone is paying you for consultancy but that is not ethical.... a one off here or there, or teaching someone how to use the autospreader - ok np.... but it def bc an issue with mass marketing, especially to aspiring retail traders who will pay you 7500 usd but not learn how to make any money from your strategies. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodity_trading_advisor Under the Commodity Exchange Act, CTAs must register with and conform to the regulations of the CFTC, including providing records and reports, unless they meet the Commission's criteria for exemption.[1][18] Registered CTAs must also become members of the NFA if they manage funds or provide advice to members of the public.[19]
OK, I stand corrected. I think he is making a mistake using that word and regardless of what the requirements actually are, that is one word you want to avoid under all circumstances in the financial world. I'm surprised he put that in there. There really is no added benefit to him to reaching out to that crowd. And the liability of that is endless. Basically selling nickel puts.
From the NFA website: A CTA is an individual or organization which, for compensation or profit, advises others as to the value of or the advisability of buying or selling futures contracts, options on futures, retail off-exchange forex contracts or swaps. Providing advice includes exercising trading authority over a customer's account as well as giving advice based upon knowledge of or tailored to customer's particular commodity interest account, particular commodity interest trading activity, or other similar types of information. Registration is required unless: â¾You have provided advice to 15 or fewer persons during the past 12 months and do not generally hold yourself out to the public as a CTA or â¾You are in one of a number of businesses or professions listed in the Commodity Exchange Act or are registered in another capacity and your advice is solely incidental to your principal business or profession or â¾You are providing advice that is not based upon knowledge of or tailored to customer's particular commodity interest account, particular commodity interest trading activity, or other similar types of information, such as, for example â¢You make recommendations, such as advice to buy or sell specific futures contracts should a particular price level be reached, through newsletters, books and periodicals. The advice includes specific recommendations and the recipients of publications all receive the same advice or â¢You provide specific advice through e-mails, facsimiles, an Internet web site, telephone calls or face-to-face meetings with customers consisting of instructions to buy or sell a futures contract based on a computerized trading system, which also is available for purchase and use on a personal computer, and the customers all receive the same advice or â¢You conduct seminars at which you teach attendees how to trade commodity futures contracts aided by a software program that you sell and you invite seminar attendees to participate in a question-and-answer session at which you provide commodity trading advice without asking or receiving information about the personal characteristics of the attendees.
I will keep my word and not respond to the guy. I spoke to an individual at the NFA after said individual had reviewed the website and the posts to this thread. I am not going to quote the individual here, but if bone thinks he is compliant then he is nuts.
i can tell you exactly where you are potentially violating potential requirements. but at this point, i think there is enough evidence for people to decide whether or not they want to deal with you. we will have to get into legal semantics which will then get too technical and i have already spent enough time on this. i have made up my mind and hope that others do so, wisely.