Yep, I lost most of my savings in 2021. I enquired on a financial advisers website for investment advice. Was contacted by a financial adviser (so I thought) recommending investment in bonds. I knew nothing about investing, as I had only just got some money from my parentsâ estate. The website, contact details, phone number I was given all seemed legit. Although in hindsight he should have had a PA or something. Something else I guess I never thought of until afterwards was that i needed to deposit the money into a Macquarie bank account. Couple of months later Macquarie contacted my bank and said they thought the transaction was associated with a scam, and they held very little hope for recovery of the money. All of a sudden website is insecure, phone disconnected. Money gone. Who sleeps at night stealing the savings of disabled pensioners? The rest of my money now sits in a term deposit at my bank.
Hi @drnetty - I really feel for you. I am wondering if you can recall the âfinancial adviceâ website you made enquiries through, and also the name of the scam website you fell foul of. Knowing the specifics of the spam you have unfortunately become a victim of may assist others in identifying that the sites in question are scam sites.
The investment company was SPB Global Wealth Management. I am not sure of the financial advisers website, as I put in requests for advice/contact at a couple. So I am not sure and donât want to list anyone not involved. The NSW police told me that the webforms can be hacked by scammers, but I never did hear from any âactualâ financial advisors either. The sorts of websites were the âtop 10â financial planners in Melbourne website, as well as the financial planners and independent financial advisersâ websites. So it could have been one of these, and looking at them again I guess the âtop 10â one seems most likelyâŠ
Another thing is I wasnât contacted by email, the person rang and spoke to me several times over the period of a couple of weeks. He sent me a few different bonds to look at - all fake I guess - and there was no pressure to decide on the spot. He and his colleague both had British accents.
Bonds, or in this case would have been Corporate bonds, are not for investors who know little about investing. They are not for those not prepared to take risks.
You may get the return indicated, or you may not. There is no guarantee.
You cannot get your capital back before the bond matures, unless it is tradeable on an exchange market. And then you may only get what a buyer may be prepared to offer.
I have some rules about investing.
- Only invest in something I understand.
- Only invest in something that I can get my capital out of in a short time in case I need the money. May loose some, but better to be able to get some than nothing.
- Only deal with an investment advisor or facilitator that is based in Australia and I can sit down with face to face in my home city.
Agree, and all advisersâ associations I went to were Australian based. But the scammers can still harvest your information. Obviously you live and learn, but the address and phone number of SPG was in Melbourne. Although they told me it was an English-based firm.
I actually saw a person from Melbourne recently interviewed on ABC who was scammed in almost the exact same way, except in his case the adviser said they were from Citibank. He gave them $200k, but in the end only lost about $4k as his bank was able to retrieve most of it. If only that had been the case for me! I hope if people take anything from this, it is that even if you are disabled and canât go to your bank like me - make them come to you, or join another trusted institution with advisers who will come and see you in person. Even if it costs more initially for the consultation, it could save you a whole lot down the track!
