Sometimes entities appear to target Hong Kong investors whilst not having been licensed to carry out regulated activities in Hong Kong. They often adopt names similar to legitimate financial institutions to confuse investors. Alternatively, such unlicensed entities may provide financial investment trading platforms on the Internet. If you deal with a company which is not licensed by the SFC, you may not be protected by the regulatory framework enforced by the SFC.

Deal only with licensed entities and hang up on cold callers. To check whether an entity is an SFC licensee, visit our Public Register of Licensed Persons and Registered Institutions.

Dubious websites may offer too-good-to-be-true investment opportunities (e.g. pre-IPO stocks of fabricated companies sold at huge discounts, or funds with guaranteed multiple returns) that do not actually exist. Alternatively, such websites may be fraudulent copycat websites imitating the websites of reputable financial institutions to lure investors to part with their money and/or disclose personal information that the fraudsters may later use to swindle investors.

Do not respond to investment website offers unless you are sure of the legitimacy of the entity.

Do not respond to suspicious virtual asset trading platform (VATP) offers if its operator is not licensed. To check whether a VATP is licensed by the SFC, please visit our List of licensed virtual asset trading platforms. 

Some VATPs that appear to operate in Hong Kong or target Hong Kong investors may not have a licence to provide virtual asset service or carry out regulated activities in the city. They may lure investors with too-good-to-be-true investment offers, falsely claim to be or soon to be licensed in Hong Kong and/or overseas, or promote themselves aggressively through social media, instant messages, so-called “key opinion leaders” (KOLs) or any other forms of advertisements.

If you deal with a VATP which is not licensed by the SFC, please note that it is unregulated and not supervised by the SFC. You may lose your entire investment held on the VATP if it ceases operation, collapses, is hacked or otherwise suffers from any misappropriation of assets. Seeking recourse against those VATPs without a nexus with Hong Kong can be very difficult and legal remedies may not be available.

Phishes usually imitate legitimate financial institutions to despatch emails to entice recipients to disclose their credit card / bank account numbers and passwords / Personal Identification Numbers (PINs). If you provide this information, you may find your account is drained of money.

Most legitimate banks will never email you asking for your details or PIN. If in doubt, contact your bank directly.

Creating a fake regulator and/or market operator website is one of the tricks used to deceive unwary investors into thinking that certain unauthorised financial institutions or intermediaries listed on that website are supervised by a real regulator and that they conduct their trades through a recognised market operator (e.g. stock exchanges). The scamsters create a website for a non-existent financial regulator or market operator with a plausible name. Such a website is usually sophisticated and often contains up-to-date financial news to create a false impression of authenticity. In fact, no such financial regulator or market operator exists under that name.

To check whether a financial regulator and market operator really exists, see the member lists of the International Organization of Securities Commissions and the World Federation of Exchanges respectively.