BigT1
Sergeant Major
- Messages
- 951
Hello new member tuff2trade,
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Welcome to FPA. You need not consider yourself at fault if ever you somehow become a victim of a scam.
You are certainly not the first, nor will you be the last; but when scammed, it is usually innocence, ignorance, or idiocy that permits one to fall into an even a poorly laid trap.
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You must understand some things about registration requirements in the US.
Apiary Fund is a private company, not a publicly owned stock corporation where investors own a share in the company and where the company would therefore be subject to SEC Regulation.
They do not operate a brokerage or dealership, nor are they money managers of public funds.
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Edgar is a reporting service for publicly owned corporations that have issued registered bonds and/or stocks, and who are listed and traded on an exchange.
Edgar is not involved with privately held companies like Apiary; who are under no legal or moral obligation to disclose to you their inner workings.
The fact that there are no Edgar filings in completely irrelevant for this company.
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You must also understand the CFTC specifically exempts "Education Services" like coaches, training providers, colleges, universities, academics, and signal service providers because they are specifically required to loudly disclaim they are not providing you 'Investment Advice'.
Without such exemption in the law, it would be truly impossible to educate any student of finance or train any trader in any educational institution or brokerage anywhere.
In my opinion this is a necessary, useful, and entirely appropriate regulatory environment.
Without it, I myself would be unable to comment here; and what good would that serve (except the joy of my critics and those that would tear down the forest fence to fraudsters)?
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That is how Apiary functions; as a provider of financial education, software, and tools; for better or worse.
They make prominent, full disclosure of such on their website and terms of service, in compliance with those requirements.
The package they market and sell to the public is for training purposes; you are therefore warned you are personally responsible to evaluate independently the quality of their offering, and you are responsible for making your own investment decisions.
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Whenever any financial advisor chooses to make specific trade recommendations to individual non-qualified clients in exchange for a fee, he or she must be a registered representative (stock broker), a registered broker-dealer, a mutual fund manager, a CTA (like myself), a CPO, an AP working for a broker-dealer or an FCM, or an Independent Registered Investment Advisor.
This is not how Apiary is organized.
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Apiary's model includes (in addition to their proprietery education), an opportunity for trainees who are capable of learning their trading methodology and successfully applying it consistently for a while in a monitored demo account they provide and analyze, to earn an opportunity to trade Apiary's own money in exchange for a share of the profits you actually earn for them.
This is an uncommon business model that is based upon proprietery trading techniques and a business model devised about two decades ago by others, when computer technology and the emergence of the internet first made powerful trading tools available to independent traders at a reasonable cost.
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Apiary has developed their particular model to intentionally bypass the usual regulatory requirements for any trainee to first become a 'Registered Entity', in order to engage in managing OPM (other people's money); while avoiding the risks of hiring rank amateur traders who advertize unsustainable or questionable track records, such as those readily available on Zulutrade, etc.
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This is only legally possible because there is zero financial risk to the public or the trainee himself, whom once granted trading priviledges over a sub-account of their funds actually becomes a 'Section-1099 Independent Contractor' under US Internal Revenue Service rules, while risking nothing other than Apiary's own funds in the venture.
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If you as a trader that can prove yourself capable of generating profits, you shall share in them; while Apiary will absorb any losses you incur on their behalf in their account.
The better your real money results, the more of their capital you are allocated to trade, and the larger your % of the profits that become yours to keep.
Meanwhile, all poorer performers are weeded out, continuously.
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Their goal is to continually train-up a fresh group of new, successful traders, who have learned how to trade profitably, without fianancial risk to the traders themselves.
Through this process of helping Apiary Fund grow its Master Account while eventually launching one's self into a trading career with the confidence you can actually succeed in trading; theoretically, once proven you have the chops to actually do it consistently, you are now on our own.
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Yes, there is a cost to obtain this kind of training; just as is true for the priviledge of acheiving an MBA at The Wharton School, Harvard Business School, or USC.
I do not mean to compare Apiary's education with that of these esteemed institutions; but, there purposes are not dissimilar.
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I am no shill for Apiary, for I have not yet formed an opinion regarding the quality of their education or their trading methodology.
Rather, I simply defend their right to offer what they do honestly; while it remains up to you (the prospect), and to me the professional, to assess the their offering independently; and measure it against its cost.
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Just as with any University or Trade School Education, there is never a guarantee of success nor any particular job awaiting you if you actually complete your degree; but, the chances are a hell of a lot better with one, than without one.
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To that end, I am in the midst of a thorough investigation into the quality of this firm's offerings, since it has received some mixed reviews here in the past.
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Apiary's Representative: Nate Allred, has recently joined us here on FPA, and has just this week established a Review Page and Discussion Board for ApiaryFund users and observers, established at our request.
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Tuft2trade, you came here to claim you have been scammed; but you have not provided us any evidence of that, nor have you described your experience in any way to suggest it.
Now that you may better understand how this company is organized and that they are not in violation of any registration requirements I am aware of, please rethink your post and feel free to comment freely and fairly.
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Please describe just what your beef is with them.
We are all interested in hearing your 'Real World' experience with them in a factual manner, without the the hype and suspicions you initially brought.
If there are issues to be investigated we will certainly do so with you and for you, and for the greater good.
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Anthony Ingrassia, CTA
NFA ID#: 0278164
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