Under the electronic board showing the Nikkei index and the US-Japan exchange rate, currency dealers … More
Many people are probably not familiar with forex trading. Forex trading is the name of the very speculative investment of trading foreign currencies. Forex traders base their investments on expected price movements of currencies, economic indicators, the political climate and technical analysis. It is not for the faint hearted. The forex market is the largest financial market in the world with more than $7.5 trillion traded daily It is not an investment for inexperienced investors and while it certainly is legal, there have been many investment scams involving forex trading.
Recently, Michael Shannon Sims and Juan Carlos Reynoso were charged with wire fraud and money laundering related to the activities of their company OmegaPro. According to the indictment, Sims and Reynoso operated OmegaPro between 2019 and 2023 posing as a legitimate investment platform in which they promised their investors returns of up to 300% in 16 months through elite forex trading. Ultimately, according to the Justice Department, Sims and Reynoso swindled their victims out of more than 650 million dollars.
The indictment indicates alleges Sims and Reynoso lured their victims into investing with them by hosting lavish promotional events throughout the world, including projecting their OmegaPro logo on to the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world during a promotional event in Dubai.
Sims and Reynoso also projected a wildly successful lifestyle on social media displaying expensive vacations, cars, designer clothes and watches to convince potential investors of their credibility.
The unfortunate truth is that no trading actually occurred. Rather, OmegaPro operated as a Ponzi scheme paying off earlier investors with funds derived from later investors while, according to the Justice Department, Sims and Reynoso stole the investors’ money to fund the lifestyle they showed so vividly on social media.
In addition, not satisfied with operating a phony investment firm, Sims and Reynoso are accused of operating OmegaPro as a pyramid scheme in which their “investors” would earn payments for bringing in new investor-victims into the scam. The more money their investors brought in, the greater the payments they received.
Eventually, the scam collapsed, as most Ponzi schemes do, under its own weight and in 2023, investors were told that the company had been hacked, but that OmegaPro was transferring the investments to another platform called Broker Group, however, despite representations that the funds of investors were safe, the victims of the scam were unable to access either their accounts at OmegaPro or their supposed new accounts at BrokerGroup.
On July 8, 2025 indictments against both Michael Shannon Sims and Juan Carolos Reynoso were unsealed in the federal court for the District of Puerto Rico charging both men with wire fraud and money laundering. Each man faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison on each charge.
According to Matthew R. Galeotti, Head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, “As alleged, the defendants preyed upon vulnerable individuals in the U.S. and abroad, defrauding them of over $650 million by making false promises of substantial returns and that their money was safe.”
There are a number of lessons all investors should take from this case.
No one should ever invest in anything they don’t understand. Forex investing is risky and complicated and should not be done unless you are knowledgeable about trading in foreign currencies. Due diligence, for anyone considering investing in a company that does forex trading should include reading reviews of the investment company on sites such as Trustpilot and Forex Peace Army.
In addition, before investing with anyone, you should also investigate the person offering to sell you the investment with FINRA’s Broker Check. This will tell you if the broker is licensed and if there have been disciplinary procedures against him or her. You can also check with your own state’s securities regulation office for similar information. Many investment advisers will not be required to register with the SEC, but are required to register with your individual state securities regulators. You can find your state’s agency by going to the website of the North American Securities Administrators Association.
If investors had done their due diligence and looked into the backgrounds of Michael Shannon Sims and Juan Carlos Reynoso they would have learned that neither of them had any professional investment licenses, broker-dealer registrations or forex trading certifications and avoided being a victim of this investment scam.
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