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Mumbai, Oct 17 (IANS) ED’s efforts have achieved a major breakthrough, resulting in the arrest of a Spanish mastermind behind the unauthorized operations of forex trading platform OctaFX and the agency issuing orders to seize his movable assets in the form of cryptocurrencies worth about Rs 2,385 crore, an official said on Friday.
Pavel Prozorov was arrested in Spain by local law-enforcers in connection with the ED investigation against OctaFX, the official said in a statement.
The Mumbai zonal office of the Enforcement Directorate seized assets worth Rs 2,385 crore under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 for defrauding investors by falsely promising high returns.
So far, the ED has seized assets worth over Rs 2,681 crore, which include 19 immovable properties and a luxury yacht in Spain owned by Prozorov, the ED said.
According to the ED, OctaFX defrauded Indian investors of Rs 1,875 crore and made profits of Rs 5,000 crore on their investments between 2019 and 2024.
The money came under money laundering investigation after it was illegally transferred abroad.
In June, the ED seized properties in Spain in connection with the illegal forex trading case registered in Pune and conducted coordinated multi-city searches at seven locations, including Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai.
ED seized incriminating documents and digital devices during the searches as part of the ongoing investigation into the case of illegal online forex trading through international broker – OctaFx trading app and website www.octafx.com.
The federal agency said in a statement that the searches were conducted at seven locations including Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Gurgaon.
The ED initiated its investigation on the basis of an FIR lodged by Pune’s Shivaji Nagar police station against persons accused of defrauding investors with false promises of high returns through the OctaFX forex trading platform.
The federal agency’s investigation revealed that OctaFX, in partnership with OctaFx India Private Limited, operated in India without RBI authorization.
It said searches revealed that OctaFX routed investors’ funds through origin accounts to the escrow accounts of unauthorized payment aggregator Dinero Payment Services.
The ED said that fake companies masquerading as e-commerce platforms were involved by using fake KYC to access payment gateways and evade detection.
It said investors’ funds were disguised as online purchases, deposited through multiple accounts and ultimately distributed as fake foreign currency or speculative payments to obscure their origin.
–IANS
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