FlipSideFX - GNTFX PowerTrader - Brian Thomson

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Avoid Brian Thomson, GNTFX (his 'brokerage') & FlipSideFX, operating now as FXTurtleTrader.com

Brian Thomson, GNTFX, FlipSideFX.com and any other guise/name he/they operate under should be avoided, as you'll never see your money again.

I am posting this message in the hope that I prevent others from experiencing the emotional roller coaster I have been through.

A brief explanation of my experience is below:
When I opened my GNTFX PowerTrader account I categorically stated I only wanted to see the same trades as the published FlipSideFX.Com trades and nothing else whilst accepting there maybe a little slippage.
I saw my modest investment double in the first 3 months, so I requested a withdrawal, only to be told there were open positions which I couldn't see (a GNTFX fudge!) which were taking up margin.
I waited another 3 months, saw my account had now doubled again, so requested a withdrawal and received the same response, however, this time I managed to get some details of the trades which were open.
I continued to see weekly gains and my account in theory grew to more than 7x my original deposit; however, these alien swing trades were still in the background and therefore no funds were able to be withdrawn.
As the alien swing trades were long positions taken on the GBPUSD pair at ridiculously large size, especially for a swing trade, the day of the 'Brexit' referendum results wiped out not only all my account's gains but 97% of my original deposit too, so effectively a 99.6% drawdown!

Brian's response to me was: "the reason the trades were kept open overnight was that all the polls said it would be a stay which would have triggered a raise of the GBPUSD of an expected 800 - 1,200 pips which would have earned tons of money if you where long with these types of lots." I believe Brian needs to visit Gambler's Anonymous rather than be responsible for risking other people's money.

I am posting this scam alert thread is my first step in building an FPA case against this person(s), as all the evidence is currently being compiled, but I shall submit my GNTFX PowerTrader account statement for your perusal.
 

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  • PowerTrader Account Summary.pdf
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While I believe its the same as flipping a coin and is a terrible way to trade, the fact is that you chose to follow their coin.
The thing that concerns me is how there could be trades going without your knowledge.

Can you explain how the trade process works for you.
I use MT4 and there can not be trades that I am not aware/in control of.

What process are you using?
 
While I believe its the same as flipping a coin and is a terrible way to trade, the fact is that you chose to follow their coin.
The thing that concerns me is how there could be trades going without your knowledge.

Can you explain how the trade process works for you.
I use MT4 and there can not be trades that I am not aware/in control of.

What process are you using?


Agreed, in as much as I explicitly stated I wanted my GNTFX PowerTrader account to follow the same day trading trades which FlipSideFX.com post, typically these last no more than 2-3hrs although on the very odd occasion may last until the next day.

The GNTFX PowerTrader platform is configured to only report closed trades at midnight on the day they close, so there is no visibility of any open trades and hence when ghost/spurious/alien trades were opened and consuming margin, there was nothing I as a client of Brian's/GNTFX's could see.

Interestingly, on the first occasion when I requested a withdrawal, I was told there were open trades, but these were never reported on my account statement. It was only on the latter occasions, these trades were shown and here were a number of times prior to the 'Brexit' vote when the trades could've been closed for considerable profit.

It is therefore my belief, that these ghost/spurious/alien trades were fictitious trades made purely to enable this Ponzi scheme to function. Hence why Brian Thomson & FlipSideFX.com have ceased marketing their 'services' and have re-badged themselves as FXTurtleTrader.com, I come to this conclusion as their websites both offer a link to exactly the same screencast video clip of previous trading history.

Further evidence will be submitted tomorrow.
 
That would scare the hell out of me.
There is no way someone could get me to trust them to that degree.

This is going to be a very hard one to prove.
I wish you luck my friend.

I am sure the Mods here can be a lot more help than I can be.
 
Here is my abbreviated summary of my experience with Brian Thomson, FlipSideFX and GNTFX PowerTrader, included are some thoughts about these people and others who must be associated in one way or another:

My introduction to Brian Thomson was when I became aware of a manual trading system being marketed as GreenWaveFX.com, I was seduced by it’s apparent simple rule set and it’s stated trading history, this was August 2013.


The main element of this strategy which appealed to me was it’s typical risk:reward of a minimum of 1:2 and typically not risking more than ~25pips.


As an aside: I have since identified that GreenWaveFX.com's trading strategy was previously known as The Envelope Profit System and prior to that The Bollinger Profit System.


Having attempted to trade this system manually on demo for a period of time, I was unable to produce the same results as were published on a weekly basis by the GreenWaveFX.com team. I put this down to not being at my screen when the correct setups presented themselves.


I was therefore pleased when Brian Thomson launched the ‘automated’ version, marketed as GreenFlowFX.com, as it seemed to offer the opportunity to receive the trades which were being published within the marketing material. I was disappointed to find that instead of this ‘automated’ version being an Expert Advisor, it was in fact a Trade Copier using a MySQL server with expert advisor SignalSlaveMySQL+.ex4


Unfortunately, the trades I received via this Trade Copier were nothing like those published within the marketing emails, see comparison document: 20140506 - GreenWaveFX Comparison.


Brian Thomson advised me that they were experiencing difficulties with the trade copier and he would be in touch once they’d resolved things.


The next communication was another re-branding, namely FlipSideFX.com (File: FlipSideFX.com marketing email refers) and that he was going to provide very few places to traders who wanted to receive an Expert Advisor which would deliver the trades advertised. I was still interested as the alleged performance of this system, still looked promising. So I chose to take up this option, at a cost of $5,000 only to once again be disappointed to find that it still wasn’t a true Expert Advisor and that the ‘solution’ was just another implementation of the Trade Copier using a MySQL server.


Once again, the trades received via the copier were nothing like the published trades.


At this point, Brian stated he was in the process of establishing a much better solution via a broker and would be in touch when it was ready. This introduced GNTFX.com and their PowerTrader solution.


Brian Thomson then offered to send a credit of $5,000 to my GNTFX account, as a ‘refund’ for the sum already paid for the FlipSideFX.com ‘EA’, this meant I had to open and fund an account with GNTFX.com, so I opened an account with $2,500 and Brian was good to his word and sent a credit of $5,000 to the account. I had some slight reservations regarding the GNTFX.com brokerage, as their website looked very much cobbled together and not totally legit, but this was the only way I could see of getting my money back.


During the GNTFX account opening process, you are asked what risk setting you want, I asked Brian to explain which setting I should choose to enable me to see only the trades which he took using the FlipSideFx.com 5 minute based system which he used for his marketing material. he stated Level 4 was the appropriate setting.


The GNTFX PowerTrader account view mechanism shows trades which have closed and this page is only updated after midnight/1am in the morning, so it is impossible to see live/open trades.


From that point, I was able to see trades hitting my account and on a weekly basis I was able to verify those trades against the trades published by Brian within his weekly marketing emails and they were on the whole very close, so I was beginning to be happy with the service being offered, so much so, I chose to deposit a further sum of $2,500 into the account.


Unfortunately, just after doing so I received an email dated 3rd August 2015 (file: 20150803 - Marketing email from FlipSideFX)and following it’s link to the screencast of Brian’s alleged MT4 Account history I noticed a particular line which showed EURUSD against a trade which was for the GBPUSD, this set some alarm bells going, as maybe I had finally detected this offering to be nothing more than a photoshop scam. See attached file: 20150804 - Screenshot of screencast 9nxf657qj3l (I chose to keep this piece of evidence to myself, as I thought that if I was to see my account double and was successfully able to withdraw my initial capital, it would prove me wrong and maybe it was some other presentational error).


So, by 6th November 2015, my GNTFX account was looking very healthy with a balance of $25,876.26 and having just received an email from Brian saying he had stopped trading for the week, due to the upcoming NFP figures, see attached file: 20151106 - Email from FlipSideFX re All Flat.

I assumed my account was flat and therefore chose to request a withdrawal of $15,000. To my surprise I received an email from GNTFX telling me that not only was my account not flat, but there was insufficient margin available to permit a withdrawal, see attached file: 20151106 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request.


I requested information from Brian Thomson and received the attached email: 20151107 - Email from Brian confirming open positions, this email also stated he had taken trades on the 1hr and 4hr timeframes, due to my risk setting, which is not what I had asked for, as per my email: 20151108 - Email to Brian re open swing trades. I also had reason to email Brian on 18th December 2015 and reiterated my desire to only see the standard trades, as per file: 20151218 - Email to Brian.


Strangely, the trade(s) which was consuming the margin on my account were never seen on my GNTFX account summary, so I believe it was never there, just an excuse not to release any monies.


By 6th February 2016, my GNTFX account had grown further, to $42,991.63 so I chose to make another withdrawal request, this time for $15,000


Once again, I was informed there were open positions, which were invisible to me and therefore I wasn’t able to make the withdrawal. By now, this was becoming frustrating, but I didn’t know where to turn to, as tracking down ‘Brian Thomson’ was almost impossible. File: 20160213 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request refers.


My account continued to allegedly grow to $73,459.98, so on 13 April 2016, I made a further request to withdraw $15,000, once again I was told the withdrawal couldn’t be made due to open trades. I continued to attempt to make contact with Brian Thomson, in an attempt to discuss the open trades but he seemed to disappear. File: 20160619 - Email chain from 20160413 refers.

As you’ll see from that file, I was aware of the risk and the opportunities which were available to close those positions for a profit prior to the ‘Brexit’ vote, but Brian chose to ignore these, hence why once the ‘brexit’ result was known and the subsequent collapse of the GBPUSD, whereby those long held spurious/alien trades were apparently stopped out or margin called and the balance within my account stood at $311.02


I was in shock, purely because I was now able to see these trades and review them and I could not believe the offending GBPUSD trades could’ve been closed for a reasonable profit at any point between:

26 April 2016 and 04 May 2016

18 May 2016 and 20 May 2016

24 May 2016 and 31 May 2016

07 June 2016 and 08 June 2016

19 June 2016 and 23 June 2016

If ‘Brian Thomson’ was a professional risk manager, he would’ve taken advantage of those moments in the market and would’ve either taken profit or at least reduced the level of risk (700pips) to something more in keeping with his base trading style.



Following this disastrous result, I approached Brian Thomson for an explanation, I was very surprised at his response, see attached file: 20160627 - Email from Brian re brexit polls.



Although I am frustrated at myself by being taken in by all of his offerings and continuing to throw money at his various ‘solutions’, my main concern now is to try and prevent anyone else falling for this scam.


I have identified a number of webpages who offer GNTFX PowerTrader facilities, I list them below. These are all touting the same trade results and therefore I conclude that Brian Thomson, any other name by which he presents himself and GNTFX are all in this together and possibly one and the same person. I also know a person by the name of Casper Mikkelsen is linked to at least some of this debacle.




The various webpages which offer the same GNTFX PowerTrader solutions are:

FlipSideFX.com

FXTurtleTrader.com

autofxprofit.com - please note this site show the same video, although updated to 7th April 2016 and includes the’EURUSD mistake’ of 22nd July 2015.

evolutionfxfx.com

bollingerfxsystem.com

fx30i.com

gaincashnow.com & onlinelucrative.com currently forward to bollingerfxsystem.com




So all of the above domain names, are likely to be scams too. I suggest this, purely because there is no need to have various entities all offering the same solution, unless you’re trying to avoid being traced.


I attach the following files for reference regarding the other domain names:

20161227 - FXTurtleTrader.com - ROI

Evolutionfxfx webpage excerpt



I have chosen not to upload the video files from the various webpages as they are between 30MB and 55MB each, although I can obviously provide them if required.
 

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  • 20140506 - GreenWaveFX Comparison.pdf
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  • 20150803 - Marketing email from FlipSideFX.png
    20150803 - Marketing email from FlipSideFX.png
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  • 20150804 - Screenshot of screencast 9nxf657qj3l.jpg
    20150804 - Screenshot of screencast 9nxf657qj3l.jpg
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  • 20151106 - Email from FlipSideFX re All Flat.png
    20151106 - Email from FlipSideFX re All Flat.png
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  • 20151106 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request.jpg
    20151106 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request.jpg
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  • 20151107 - Email from Brian confirming open positions.png
    20151107 - Email from Brian confirming open positions.png
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  • 20151108 - Email to Brian re Open Swing Trades.jpg
    20151108 - Email to Brian re Open Swing Trades.jpg
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  • 20151218 - Email to Brian.jpg
    20151218 - Email to Brian.jpg
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  • 20160213 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request.jpg
    20160213 - Email from GNTFX re Withdrawal request.jpg
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  • 20160428 - Email from GNTFX support re Withdrawal request.jpg
    20160428 - Email from GNTFX support re Withdrawal request.jpg
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Here are the additional files to this post
 

Attachments

  • 20160619 - Email chain from 20160413.pdf
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  • 20160627 - Email from Brian re brexit polls.png
    20160627 - Email from Brian re brexit polls.png
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  • FlipSideFX marketing email.jpg
    FlipSideFX marketing email.jpg
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  • Evolutionfxfx webpage excerpt.png
    Evolutionfxfx webpage excerpt.png
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Here's some further evidence of GNTFX being somewhat amateur at best and totally inept at worse.

As their Demo accounts expire after an amount of time, I tried kept 5 demo accounts running alongside my live account, one for each risk level, as I wanted to see the differences between each risk level. As is turned out, there were no differences whatsoever.

The two files I attach to this post show the trades associated with two demo accounts, which ran consecutively between 24 January 2016 and 01 August 2016.
The first file shows all the trades which occurred between 24 January 2016 and 13 April 2016, this was the period when the spurious/alien trades were opened, but there was no sign of them on these summaries, see file: 20160425 - GNTFX Demo Account Expired.
The second shows the all of the trades which occurred between 24 April and 1 August 2016, this shows no trades were opened between those dates; however, it shows all the losing trades which closed on 24 June 2016. How could these trades be associated with an account which wasn't opened until after those trades had apparently opened? see file: 20160801 - GNTFX Demo Account Expired.


Please can the moderator add GNTFX and PowerTrader to the Tags for this thread, so that anyone tempted by the other webpages has the opportunity to see this malpractice.
 

Attachments

  • 20160425 - GNTFX Demo Account Expired.pdf
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  • 20160801 - GNTFX Demo Account Expired.pdf
    75.4 KB · Views: 7
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