Ariol Investment Group review: Trading instruments, Platforms, Broker features, and Traders ratings.

I have lost a significant amount of money since setting up a trading account with Ariol Investment Group ariolinv-gr.com, who are an unregulated broker and despite the info on the website, are very difficult to contact unless you do this directly via your 'account manager' who provides you with a number that you can WhatsApp them on. Otherwise, phone numbers do not work, the address on the website is insufficient to trace them, live chat does not work and emails go unanswered. I now strongly suspect they are operating using demo accounts only, and that the trades have not even been placed.

In Feb 23 I opened an account with min. balance of $250 (paid in in crypto) and made some profit. I withdrew a small amount but was pressured into trading with more ($25k) under the assurance of great profits. This was applied as an 'awaiting deposit', and I was told once I had paid this off, I could withdraw my profits. In hindsight the account manager was so disrespectful of my money - leaving large trades open for days at a time, no clear strategy, high risk, large trades left open over the weekend etc etc....

Once I paid off the deposit the first time I tried to withdraw but was told by my account manager as it was a Friday night the financial dept. wouldn't be there to approve it, so I should wait until after the weekend.
Anyway, that weekend just so happened to be the weekend of the Silicon Valley Bank crash, so come Monday AM, all my trades that were open (and there were quite a few) had plummeted and my margin was described as very poor. At this point I was pressured into agreeing to another awaiting deposit, which I really did not want to do as I had no money to pay it off. I was essentially threatened with losing all of my money at this point and felt as though I had no choice but to accept another deposit.

Many things went wrong after this, and I tried on many occasions to say I couldn't pay the credit back and wanted it removed (which an agreement drawn up by Ariol said I could do if I didn't pay before the deadline). Then I was I told I'd had a margin call and this wouldn't be possible (note this was never communicated before this point). My account was then passed onto the 'financial department' and things started to get really ugly for me.

Now Ariol start to threaten me with a court case and AML implications. Saying I've made profit with company money and needed to repay the awaiting deposit. The whole AML reference is hilarious really, considering Ariol are not regulated and have been accused of scamming people on multiple occasions. All the while, 1 star reviews are appearing on Trustpilot saying the company is scamming people out of multiple thousands. Despite this, I was intimidated and scared at this point. My account manager then offered to pay half the deposit off if I just came up with the rest - they said they did it to help clients all the time. I'm ashamed to say there appeared to be a relationship there at this point, so I agreed. Plus, I was completely terrified and felt out of options. So we did this but then surprise surprise, they got 'caught' by the company, suposedly sacked, and I'm left still 'owing' half the deposit amount. I was told once again that if I just paid the remaining deposit I could withdraw. But I know that's bull**** and no matter how much money I give this company, I'll never be able to withdraw the profits (if they even exist).

I realise that getting any of my money back is a slim to none chance (all transactions were made in crypto), so I am now going down the route of desperately trying to warn others off of this 'company' and hopefully prevent someone else suffering as I have done. I am reporting to the authorities in the UK and will be trying my best to get them investigated. Ariol are also linked with Globalteers and another comapny called Traderview - they are registered offshore on the Marshall Islands. They claim that their Amsterdam offices are at Claude Debussylaan 161082MD but I cannot find any evidence of this and I only have the address as I challenged my 'account manager' to provide me with an address when my suspicions were increasing. If anyone else has had dealdings with these people, please also report them to the authorities so that we can help others and raise awareness.