TradeWin24 Exposed in Insider Trading Scandal
Miroslav Radaković, Srdjan Bošković, Milija Babović, and Srdjan Mandić, all currently owners and top figures of TradeWin24, were already convicted in 2016 and given suspended misdemeanor penalties for insider trading in the shares of Sojaprotein (SJPT), even though the law provides for a ban on performing activities and participating in Serbia’s financial market, the revocation of licenses, and criminal charges in cases involving large-scale investor fraud.
At the end of October 2016, on the official website of the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., there appeared, almost hidden among a mass of documents, a statement concerning the current leaders of TradeWin24, who at the time were schemers within the financial pyramid of Sinteza Invest Group, in which the brokerage house Sinteza Invest Group, now better known as TradeWin24, was sanctioned because of insider trading and the damage suffered by both the market organizer and investors. In the statement published by the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., following proceedings conducted by the Disciplinary Commission of the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., the following was announced:
“The Exchange Member – SINTEZA INVEST GROUP A.D. BELGRADE, company number 17456164, with Exchange membership status since 20 February 2003, IS RESPONSIBLE for violations under Article 165, paragraph 1, items (1) and (3) of the Exchange Rules due to: – violating obligations established by Article 34, paragraph 1, item 1 of the Exchange Rules and – acting contrary to Article 153, paragraph 2, items (5) and (7), sub-item 1 of the Exchange Rules.
This occurred in such a way that, during stock-exchange sessions held in the period from 26 January 2016 to 29 March 2016, in trading the shares of the issuer ‘Sojaprotein’ a.d. Bečej (hereinafter: SJPT), it carried out acts constituting market abuse by misusing information that its client would place a large-volume buy order for SJPT shares, information that was not available to all participants on the Exchange, by using that information to place its own prior trading orders (within market-making orders) in SJPT shares, the execution of which allowed it to derive benefit from that information."
At the end of October 2016, on the official website of the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., there appeared, almost hidden among a mass of documents, a statement concerning the current leaders of TradeWin24, who at the time were schemers within the financial pyramid of Sinteza Invest Group, in which the brokerage house Sinteza Invest Group, now better known as TradeWin24, was sanctioned because of insider trading and the damage suffered by both the market organizer and investors. In the statement published by the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., following proceedings conducted by the Disciplinary Commission of the Belgrade Stock Exchange a.d., the following was announced:
“The Exchange Member – SINTEZA INVEST GROUP A.D. BELGRADE, company number 17456164, with Exchange membership status since 20 February 2003, IS RESPONSIBLE for violations under Article 165, paragraph 1, items (1) and (3) of the Exchange Rules due to: – violating obligations established by Article 34, paragraph 1, item 1 of the Exchange Rules and – acting contrary to Article 153, paragraph 2, items (5) and (7), sub-item 1 of the Exchange Rules.
This occurred in such a way that, during stock-exchange sessions held in the period from 26 January 2016 to 29 March 2016, in trading the shares of the issuer ‘Sojaprotein’ a.d. Bečej (hereinafter: SJPT), it carried out acts constituting market abuse by misusing information that its client would place a large-volume buy order for SJPT shares, information that was not available to all participants on the Exchange, by using that information to place its own prior trading orders (within market-making orders) in SJPT shares, the execution of which allowed it to derive benefit from that information."
Given that Sojaprotein was owned by Viktoria Group, and that Milija Babović sat on the management board of Viktoria Group while also being the owner of Sinteza Invest Group, it is quite clear what was happening in this criminal scenario. Sinteza Invest Group was the broker for Sojaprotein and at the same time acted as a market maker on the Belgrade Stock Exchange. According to the decision of the Belgrade Stock Exchange, Milija Babović was supplying Sinteza Invest Group with insider information about Viktoria Group’s business moves, including information on the quantity of Sojaprotein shares for sale, a company listed on the Belgrade Stock Exchange. Sinteza Invest Group, at that time with Miroslav Radaković as executive director and Srdjan Bošković as general director, today both owners of TradeWin24, used this information to gain an advantage in the market, in other words to secure financial benefit at the expense of uninformed investors who naively believed that a regulated capital market existed in Serbia and that such frauds were impossible.
Not only did this financial octopus fail to stop with financial fraud, but even after the Belgrade Stock Exchange decision was issued on 26 October 2016, these financial schemers continued their frauds within Sinteza Invest Group itself, where clients’ money disappeared from their accounts during that same year. Although the Securities Commission only opened an investigation and shut down this schemers’ house under pressure from investors, that same Commission then allowed the leaders of Sinteza Invest Group to open a new brokerage house under the name TradeWin24, in clear violation of the Capital Market Law and subordinate regulations.
It took the Commission four years to close this fraudulent brokerage house and merely revoke the brokerage license of executive director Miroslav Radaković, while ignoring the scale of the problem and the damage suffered by investors. After that, the Commission continued to make mistakes and to engage in supposed market regulation that exists only on paper.
By what logic and under what law can the twice-punished leaders of Sinteza Invest Group open a new brokerage house while leaving the old one buried in debt? That is a question for the Securities Commission. At the time of writing this article, those responsible within the Securities Commission did not want to comment, while those responsible at TradeWin24, as usual, were not answering their phones.
For investors interested in the details of how TradeWin24, formerly Sinteza Invest Group, engaged in insider trading at the expense of small investors, how it robbed them, and what modus operandi was used, the decision of the Belgrade Stock Exchange can be downloaded by clicking here.