Unfolding the mystery behind Instaforex real owners and activities

instascam

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Everyone knows Instaforex, the infamous, two-sided, Forex company.
Heads : a forex website, in business since 2007, boasting hundreds of thousands, sometimes several million customers, a worldwide presence through offices and partners, prestigious sports sponsorship contracts, luxury cars and tremendous amounts of cash handed over to customers in regularly held raffles, countless prizes, distinctions and favourable business reviews won from multiple organisations and media. This is "the Best Broker in Asia" side of the Instaforex story.
Tails : a troubled history, regulatory warnings, indictments and prosecution across the globe, forums filled with allegations of fraud, scam and complaints. This is the "biggest Forex scam on the internet" side of Instaforex.

So yes, everyone knows "Instaforex"...but nobody knows who "Instaforex" is.
What is the mysterious "Instaforex Group of Companies" or "Instaforex Group" operating the instaforex.com website and other related websites ? Who are its directors, shareholders and beneficiaries ?
Whenever a trader gets scammed, who should he sue to get his money back ?
How does this website manages to stay in business if it has apparently that many problems ?
And, finally, is the business of "Instaforex" as legit as they claim it to be, or does it relates to things which go way beyond the "simple" fact of providing forex services without a license and are much, much murkier ?

These questions seem to be quite complicated to answer, due to the opacity surrounding "Instaforex Group of Companies". Even regulators seemingly had stopped to try to identify and prosecute the entities and individuals behind the unlicensed activities of instaforex.com, simply blacklisting the website itself and "Instaforex" or "Instaforex Group of Companies".
But recently a lot of information has been surfacing, through Court cases, indictments and other official sources.
So, in order to get acquainted with "Instaforex", let's first see who owns the website, the brand, and the logo :

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

INSTAFOREX - Trademark Details

Status: 701 - Section 8-AcceptedSerial Number

85320322

Registration Number

4074147

Word Mark

INSTAFOREX

Status
701 - Section 8-Accepted

Status Date

2017-11-15

Filing Date

2011-05-13

Registration Number

4074147

Registration Date

2011-12-20

Mark Drawing
4000 - Standard character mark Typeset

Published for Opposition Date

2011-10-04

Attorney Name

Curt Handley, Esq.

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 1 of 6

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

Law Office Assigned Location Code

M30

Employee Name

MARTIN, LIEF ANDREW

Statements

Goods and Services

Electronic financial trading services; Financial advice and consultancy services; Financial analysis and research services; News reporting services in the field of financial news

Pseudo Mark

INSTANT FOREIGN EXCHANGE

Pseudo Mark

INSTANT FOREIGN EXCHANGE

Classification Information

International Class
036 - Insurance; financial affairs; monetary affairs; real estate affairs. - Insurance; financial affairs; monetary affairs; real estate affairs.

US Class Codes

100, 101, 102

Class Status Code 6 - Active

Class Status Date

2011-05-19

Primary Code

036

First Use Anywhere Date

2007-05-27

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 2 of 6

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

First Use In Commerce Date

2007-05-27

Current Trademark Owners

Party Name

INSTA HOLDING LTD.

Party Type
32 - 2nd New Owner Entered After Registration

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Trademark Owner History

Party Name

INSTA HOLDING LTD.

Party Type
32 - 2nd New Owner Entered After Registration

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Party Name

INSTA HOLDING LTD.

Party Type
31 - 1st New Owner Entered After Registration

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 3 of 6

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Party Name

Ekaterina Pobedinskaya

Party Type
30 - Original Registrant

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Party Name

Ekaterina Pobedinskaya

Party Type
20 - Owner at Publication

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Party Name

Ekaterina Pobedinskaya

Party Type
10 - Original Applicant

Legal Entity Type 03 - Corporation

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 4 of 6

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

Correspondences

Name

Curt Handley, Esq.

Address

Please log in with your Justia account to see this address.

Trademark Events

Event Date

Event Description

2011-05-17

NEW APPLICATION ENTERED IN TRAM

2011-05-19

NEW APPLICATION OFFICE SUPPLIED DATA ENTERED IN TRAM

2011-05-20

NOTICE OF PSEUDO MARK MAILED

2011-08-30

ASSIGNED TO EXAMINER

2011-08-30

APPROVED FOR PUB - PRINCIPAL REGISTER

2011-10-04

PUBLISHED FOR OPPOSITION

2011-10-04

OFFICIAL GAZETTE PUBLICATION CONFIRMATION E-MAILED

2011-10-04

OFFICIAL GAZETTE PUBLICATION CONFIRMATION E-MAILED

2011-12-20

REGISTERED-PRINCIPAL REGISTER

2012-04-27

TEAS CHANGE OF CORRESPONDENCE RECEIVED

2012-06-06

AUTOMATIC UPDATE OF ASSIGNMENT OF OWNERSHIP

2013-01-09

ASSIGNMENT OF OWNERSHIP NOT UPDATED AUTOMATICALLY

2013-09-03

TEAS CHANGE OF OWNER ADDRESS RECEIVED

2013-09-03

APPLICANT/CORRESPONDENCE CHANGES (NON-RESPONSIVE) ENTERED

2016-12-20

COURTESY REMINDER - SEC. 8 (6-YR) E-MAILED

2017-10-19

TEAS SECTION 8 RECEIVED

2017-11-14

CASE ASSIGNED TO POST REGISTRATION PARALEGAL

2017-11-15

POST REGISTRATION ACTION MAILED - SEC. 8

2017-11-15

TEAS RESPONSE TO OFFICE ACTION-POST REG RECEIVED

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 5 of 6

INSTAFOREX Trademark of Ekaterina Pobedinskaya - Registration Number 4074147 - Serial Number 85320322 :: Justia Trademarks 31.07.19, 0)18

2017-11-15

REGISTERED - SEC. 8 (6-YR) ACCEPTED

2017-11-15

NOTICE OF ACCEPTANCE OF SEC. 8 - E-MAILED

https://trademarks.justia.com/853/20/instaforex-85320322.html Page 6 of 6


Our series of carefully sourced publications will continue explore in-depth the reality behind Instaforex, so stay tuned, and get ready for some surprises.
 
Hello FPA readers !
Continuing with yesterday's series, we are exploring the ownership of instaforex.com website.
One could be tempted to believe that the company owning the website would be the British Virgin Islands company under license which is supposed to deliver the services to users.
Well, in fact no : it looks like it is in fact the very same company "INSTA HOLDING" which is also the current owner of the brand name INSTAFOREX, as per shown yesterday from the registers of international trademarks, as shown from a notarial act (6 pages attached).
 

Attachments

  • Notary1.pdf
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  • Notary2.pdf
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  • Notary3.pdf
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  • Notary4.pdf
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  • Notary5.pdf
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  • Notary6.pdf
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So we went to see what was this mysterious INSTA HOLDING company was.
And we started to uncover couple of very interesting things, to be revealed in our next edition.

But first, meet INSTA HOLDING, it's all in the attached files from the company's registered documents.
Share Certificate.jpg
 

Attachments

  • Certificate of Incorporation INSTAHOLDING.pdf
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  • Director Appointment INSTAHOLDING.pdf
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So we decided to check for related companies in the same place, and look what we foundCertificate of incorporationIS.jpg
Certificate of incorporationIS.jpg
 

Attachments

  • Director applointement IS.jpg
    Director applointement IS.jpg
    129.6 KB · Views: 57
So we decided to take a good look at what else we could find on this address, and found couple of interesting things there :

First, a relative newcomer in the vibrant Forex scene : meet forexpenguin.com
At first look, it seemed to be another unlicensed broker registered in Seychelles, but then we found this :

InstaForex  - Forex Penguin.jpg
 

Attachments

  • InstaForex - $1500 No Deposit Bonus - Forex Penguin.pdf
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  • InstaForex - $1500 No Deposit Bonus - Forex Penguin.jpg
    InstaForex - $1500 No Deposit Bonus - Forex Penguin.jpg
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  • image.png
    image.png
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Now, this whole penguin thing looked way way less independent from Instaforex, and we will revert back to it later on.
Meanwhile, dear FPA readers, avoid forexpenguin.com like a plague, because these guys are in fact nothing more than Instaforex.
 
Our curiosity being aroused, we kept on digging at the same address, and here is what we found : it is also the home of Quasi Networks Ltd.
quasinetworks_whois_highlight-699x1024.png


And Quasi Networks Ltd are not exactly in the friendly Forex business.....

Please meet another Instaforex related endeavour, in the very words of Dan Snider's excellent paper on Medium :

Anon-IB, Quasi Networks and the Online Exploitation of Women

Part 1 here :
https://medium.com/@dephekt/anon-ib-quasi-networks-and-the-online-exploitation-of-women-dc2649daba0f

Part 2 here :
https://medium.com/@dephekt/part-2-anon-ib-quasi-networks-and-the-exploitation-of-women-6a86723f44fd

Looks like the people behind Instaforex have been busy busy busy....And keep in mind these stories of online very very very close to ransomware related issues, which we will discuss later on.
 
And finally, keep in mind the fact that Quasi Networks is not only porn revenge and child porn, as Dan Snider demonstrates, but also is connected with cyberthreats, phishing of financial institutions, and much more...And keep in mind the name of this "Group-IB" Russian cybersecurity firm, because this is where it is getting very, very, very juicy...
 
But, before we dive deeper into the Instaforex world, let's revert back a moment to the new address of INSTA HOLDING since 2014. This will explain FPA readers why there is absolutely nothing to await from complaints to Seychelles financial authorities.

As exposed previously, INSTA HOLDING was, from its incorporation to 2014, registered with the following address : Suite 1, Sound & Vision House, Francis Rachel Str, Victoria, Mahe, Seychelles.

That is, with these guys : ALPHA CONSULTING GROUP
Seychelles | Alpha Consulting JPEG.jpg
 
Now, their new address (which is not fully represented to ICANN, but, hey, who cares....) which we managed to procure, is the following one : 103 Sham Peng Tong Plaza Victoria,Mahe,Seychelles

That would be with these guys : APOLLO INTERNATIONAL

Apollo JPEG.jpg
 
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