By DayakDaily Team
KUCHING, June 22: An individual, who is only to be known as ‘Mr Ngo’, has raised concerns over the conduct of an online trading platform known as ‘Fintana’, alleging that a broker assigned to his account encouraged high-risk trading strategies and discouraged him from exiting a loss-making position through a stop-loss measure.
In a statement, Michael Kong Feng Nian, who is the special assistant to Sarawak Democratic Action Party (DAP) chairman Chong Chieng Jen, said Ngo first came across an online advertisement promoting the platform and became interested in learning more about investing and trading.
He subsequently opened an account and was informed that the platform utilised artificial intelligence (AI)-generated trading strategies, with brokers assigned to guide investors through their trades and investments.
“Initially, Mr Ngo experienced some profits on the platform. Encouraged by these early gains, he continued investing and carrying out trades through the platform,” said Kong.
According to Kong, the broker held daily Zoom calls with Ngo to advise him on trades and investment strategies. Ngo claimed the platform allowed trading leverage of up to 1:400, which carries extremely high risks as such levels of leverage mean that even small market movements can potentially lead to devastating financial losses.
He said that Ngo became concerned when the assigned broker recommended trades began suffering substantial losses. To limit further losses, Ngo decided to activate a stop-loss measure and exit the trade.
However, the broker allegedly strongly rebuked him and accused him of undermining their strategy and trading position.
“This incident caused Mr Ngo to become suspicious and uncomfortable with the platform’s conduct. Every investor should have the right to independently decide when to enter or exit a trade, particularly when managing risks and minimising losses.
“Following this incident, Mr Ngo noticed that the broker continued carrying out trades which allegedly resulted in further consistent losses. The broker also allegedly encouraged him to deposit additional funds into the account to continue ‘cost averaging’ the losing positions,” said Kong.
He said that Ngo feared that, due to the extremely high leverage involved, there may eventually be attempts to pursue recovery of the alleged trading losses against him, to which Kong said that, should such a situation occur, he would assist him in whatever way possible.
“Mr Ngo shared his story not because he expects to recover his losses, but because he hopes his experience can serve as a public reminder and lesson to others. He openly admitted that there may have been a lapse in judgment on his part in trusting such online investment platforms too quickly.
“I therefore wish to remind the public to exercise extreme caution when encountering online advertisements promoting investment opportunities or trading platforms with promises of easy profits,” he said.
Kong also reminded members of the public to always conduct proper checks and due diligence before depositing funds or participating in any investment platform, which includes verifying whether the platform is properly licensed and regulated by the relevant financial authorities.
“The public should also be extremely wary of platforms or brokers that encourage excessive leverage trading and pressure investors into depositing more funds.
“I hope Mr Ngo’s experience serves as an important reminder to the public to remain vigilant, cautious, and responsible before investing their hard-earned savings into any online platform,” he said. — DayakDaily
