The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has warned
Australian investors about emails that enticed them into scams and
get-rich-quick schemes.
Peter Kell, executive director of consumer protection at ASIC, told a
seminar --Financial Literacy: An Australian Priority -- that in the past
few months unlicensed offshore stockbrokers had re-emerged in the
marketplace. “They are cold calling and emailing Australian investors
offering shares,” Kell said.
He also warned that some of these “offshore cold callers” were targeting
people who had low value shares bought a couple of years ago, offering
to swap them for other shares. “Once the investor becomes interested,
the cold caller asks for extra money, sometimes for fees and sometimes
for options to get extra shares to close the detail,” according to an
ASIC statement.
Kell warned that once this extra money was sent offshore it could be
lost forever.
In addition, ASIC was also warning consumers about overpriced start-up
companies and share trading get rich quick schemes. Among its
suggestions, ASIC urged consumers to not be fooled by business-like
websites, or email offers made by strangers.
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