CFTC Fines Minneapolis Futures Broker $100,000 for Fraudulent Misconduct

The (CFTC) announced on Friday that it has charged futures broker, Christian Robert Mayer with engaging in a fraudulent trading scheme. As a result, Mayer will have to pay a $100,00 .
In addition, the US regulator has also placed permanent trading and registration bans on Mayer. The CFTC has charged him with violating the Commodity Exchange Act and has ordered him to cease from further violations.
Mayer was a registered Associated Person of a Minneapolis Commodity Trading Advisor and Introducing Broker (IB). Between October 29, 2014, and September 28, 2016, he was found to be engaged in a fraudulent trading scheme which involved unauthorized trades in cattle, crude oil, and wheat futures contracts.
Mayer’s tactics
After making said trades, Mayer would then transfer the profitable trades to his own account, while leaving the losing trades in the client’s accounts. Then, he would log onto the online portal of the Futures Commission Merchant that carried all the accounts and report that the reason for the trade transfer request was because he had placed the trade in the wrong account.
According to the statement from the , when the IB realized what Mayer was doing, it reacted immediately and refunded the defrauded customers up to $105,090 in total. This amount is the total of losing trades Mayer left in the affected customers’ accounts and the profitable trades that he transferred into his own account.