From Israeli Courtrooms to Ukrainian Offices: The Story of a Global Binary Options Network

For years, Israel was widely regarded as the global hub of the binary options industry: a market officially promoted as a sophisticated, technology-driven financial service, yet one that, for thousands of investors across multiple countries, ended in much the same way: lost savings, frozen accounts, and vanished “brokers.” While Israeli call centers aggressively targeted clients in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and across Europe, victims increasingly turned to the courts in an attempt to recover at least part of their losses.

In response to a growing wave of complaints, Israeli courts began hearing dozens of civil lawsuits against individuals and companies that plaintiffs alleged were behind binary options platforms. Most of these cases ended in out-of-court settlements, without judicial rulings, but also without full exoneration of the defendants. At the same time, Israeli police and prosecutors faced years of criticism for what many described as a sluggish response to investigating the industry, while U.S. law enforcement agencies steadily intensified criminal proceedings against key market operators.

Yet the Israeli story represents only one part of the broader geography of the business. Following tighter regulation in the European Union and the eventual ban on binary options, parts of the industry’s infrastructure, including call centers, operational teams, and technical support networks, began relocating to other jurisdictions, particularly in Eastern Europe. Ukraine emerged as one of the nodes in this ecosystem, with offices, call centers, and companies working with foreign clients while employing many of the same tactics previously documented by Israeli journalists and investigators: high-pressure sales techniques, psychological manipulation, and the illusion of consistently “successful trading.”

Amid the failure of Israeli police and prosecutors to effectively investigate and prosecute perpetrators of online fraud, Israeli courts are seeing a slew of civil lawsuits by alleged victims overseas against Israelis they allege have defrauded them through binary options and related schemes.

Israeli court filings show that dozens of lawsuits have been filed against Israeli binary options companies by former clients in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, India, Belize and Singapore, as well as numerous alleged victims of investment fraud from Israel itself.

While it is difficult to determine precisely how many such lawsuits have been filed - since Israel’s courts database is not searchable by keyword, estimates the number to be between 50 and 100 in the last two years.

Some of these lawsuits are ongoing, while others have ended in a settlement.

Despite the slew of civil lawsuits, and an ongoing stream of US Justice Department prosecutions of Israeli binary options fraudsters, there is little indication that Israeli police are actively investigating alleged binary options and related investment fraud.

At the industry’s height, hundreds of companies in Israel were engaged in the widely fraudulent industry, which employed thousands and allegedly fleeced victims worldwide out of billions. The unscrupulous firms would dupe victims into believing that they were investing successfully and earning money, and encourage them to deposit more and more into their accounts, until the company eventually cut off contact with the investor and disappeared with all or almost all of their money.

Many of the fraudulent operatives have since moved their operations abroad, or switched to other scams while continuing to operate from Israel. The vast majority of the perpetrators have enriched themselves at the expense of victims around the world while enjoying impunity and suffering little social stigma.

Below are synopses of several binary options-related lawsuits recently filed in Israeli courts. In almost every case, the plaintiffs traded on a website and spoke to people in a call center that they claim defrauded them. The most difficult task for most of these plaintiffs was to associate an Israeli company or individual with the website that allegedly defrauded them since binary options and forex companies often go to great lengths, using offshore companies, generic IP addresses and fake names, to hide the identities of their operators. Most of the plaintiffs finally decided whom to sue after a huge amount, sometimes months’ worth, of detective work, and in almost every case the defendants’ first line of defense was that the plaintiffs had made a mistake and sued the wrong people.

Case 48800-12-18: A couple from Wisconsin and FMCapitals.com

A couple from Kenosha, Wisconsin, sued an Israeli company called CMT Global Trading (2012) for $568,000 last December. The company, they alleged, operated the binary options websites FMarket.com and FMCapitals.com.

The couple, represented by Israeli lawyers Tom Lifshitz and Avi Aseo, claimed that they started investing in binary options in February 2017 and were promised steady profits of 10 percent a month by their broker “Frank Lee.”

They made two transfers of $250,000 each to a bank account at HSBC in Hong Kong. Some of this money was from the husband’s retirement account, the lawsuit said. All of their money was lost. The couple claimed that as a result of their losses they have suffered financial and psychological distress and owe hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes that they are unable to cover.

In addition to CMT Global Trading, two Israeli men, Daniel Kibel, Ibrahim Abu Ita, and a British citizen named David Kyte are defendants in the lawsuit. All four defendants deny any connection to binary options and claim that their company merely provided marketing services to forex and other investment companies abroad. They further claimed that their company has a license in South Africa.

Case 17978-12-18: A 67-year-old man from Indianapolis and RumeliaCapital.com

Also in December 2018, a 67-year-old man from Indianapolis sued an Israeli company called Tracy P.A.I. and its owner David Israel Cartu for $150,000.

The man, represented by Israeli lawyers Eldar Peretz and Michael Gal, lost that amount, he alleged, to a website called RumeliaCapital.com.

The complaint in the lawsuit alleged that the entire purpose of the defendant’s company “was to trick citizens abroad and obtain their money through fraud.”

The complaint alleged that when the plaintiff tried to withdraw his money he was unable to do so. Eventually, the website was shut down entirely with no recourse for the plaintiff, the lawsuit alleged.


Israeli attorney Eldar Peretz (Facebook)

The defendant, David Cartu, claimed that the plaintiff’s lawsuit was without merit and intended to harass him. He claimed that Rumelia Capital was a foreign binary options website for foreigners and has nothing to do with Israel.

He further argued that binary options was not against the law in Israel before legislation was passed to ban it in October 2017.

While he acknowledged that the company he owned, Tracy P.A.I., had given “white label” services to Rumelia Capital, he claimed that Tracy P.A.I. had no agreement with the end customer and merely provided services to the broker.

In July 2019 the plaintiff’s lawyers announced that the two sides were in the midst of intensive negotiations toward an out-of-court settlement. In September 2019 both sides asked the judge to reject the lawsuit with no order as to costs.

Case 47432-07-18 A woman from Minnesota and Beeoptions.com

Another lawsuit against Tracy P.A.I. and David Israel Cartu was filed in July 2018 and has advanced to the discovery stage.

The plaintiff, a Minnesota woman who is represented by lawyers Nimrod Assif and Haggai Carmon, is suing the defendants for NIS 5.4 million ($1.55 million).

The woman alleged that she lost the $675,000 that was in her trading account at BeeOptions.com when the site suddenly went offline in March 2016. She further alleges that Tracy ran BeeOptions.com.

Her broker, she alleged, a man who went by the name of “Ryan Daniels” and claimed to be calling her from London, had promised her online trading profits of hundreds of percentage points.

The complaint alleged that a company known as Global Transaction Services processed payments for BeeOptions.com. At a later date, processing was carried out by a company called Greymountain Management.

In court protocols, David Cartu’s attorney claimed that BeeOptions was owned by a Bulgarian and Ukrainian man as opposed to Cartu. Documents submitted by Cartu as part of the discovery process listed several companies that had acquired credit card payments for binary options companies through Greymountain Management. These were Credorax, Wirecard, Transact Pro, and Max Pay.

Case 30504-12-18 A citizen of India and Trade12.com

In December 2018, a 48-year-old man from India sued an Israeli company called Pay Trade Service Ltd. and its owner Motti Mor (formerly Miriashvili) for $148,550.

The man claimed to have lost $148,550 to the website Trade12.com.

In his defense, Mor said he does not own Trade12 and that it is owned by Exo Capital Markets Ltd., a company incorporated in the Marshall Islands. Mor acknowledged that in 2016 and 2017 (before the plaintiff allegedly lost his money) his company had provided marketing services and technology services to Trade12 but, Mor insisted, his company was never involved in the website’s trading activity nor had anyone from his company ever spoken to the plaintiff.

Fay told The Times of Israel that the judge ultimately asked him to withdraw the case because there was not enough evidence to prove the plaintiff’s assertion that Mor owned Trade12. The judge had suggested that Fay file the case again in the future should he obtain more evidence. The plaintiff was not ordered to pay the defendant’s costs.

Case 31672-05-18 A 58-year-old woman from Sweden and CentralOption.com

In May 2018, a Swedish woman sued Y.M. Central Ltd. and a man named Maor Azhari for NIS 183,112 ($53,000) over losses she allegedly incurred to the binary options website CentralOption.com.

The woman, represented by lawyers Raouf Najjar and Adam Ashkenazi, claimed that her broker “Adam Louis” had induced her to invest the money under false and fraudulent pretenses.

In court, Maor Azhari claimed that after a rough patch in his life, during which he had been in a rehab program and lost his parents, he had met a French immigrant to Israel named David Yosef who had persuaded him to register the company Y.M. Central Ltd in his name.

In fact, said Azhari, he had not been involved in the company at all and his brief relationship with the French immigrant had “ruined his life.”

Case 1346-09-18 A 52-year-old Dutch citizen and Atoslimited.com

In September 2018, a man from Holland sued L.L. Globus Ltd (an Israeli company), Globus Capital Associates Limited (registered in the UK), and Ashdod resident Nir Lankry in Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court.

The Dutch citizen, represented by lawyers Raouf Najjar and Adam Ashkenazi, sued for NIS 128,000 ($37,000), an amount he alleged he lost to the binary options website atoslimited.com.


Israeli attorney Raouf Najjar (Facebook)

In order to trade with AtosLimited.com, the plaintiff allegedly wired money to the bank account of a company called Harty Asia Electronics Co. Ltd at HSBC in Hong Kong.

In court, Lankry’s lawyer denied that Lankry owned the binary options site, and claimed it belonged to a man named Prosper Soussan. Soussan’s lawyer acknowledged that his client’s name appeared on some of the company documents, but insisted that his client was just a straw man.

In an earlier lawsuit (60041-10-17) in which Lankry was sued by his business associate Maor Korem, Lankry claimed that he had in fact owned the atoslimited.com website together with Korem and two other silent partners. Korem said that he and Lankry and two other people had started a telemarketing company together but did not mention its name and said that it had failed due to mismanagement.

The Dutch citizen and Lankry settled the lawsuit, with Lankry agreeing to pay the plaintiff NIS 50,000 ($14,000) in 25 monthly installments.

Case 38215-07-18 A Canadian woman and OptionRally.com

In July 2018, a Canadian woman living in Belize, represented by attorney Eldar Peretz, sued two men allegedly behind the website OptionRally.com for NIS 601,202 ($173,176).

The plaintiff sued the company, E. T. Salestech, one of the Israeli companies that operated a call center for the website, but when she learned that the company was in liquidation, she argued that the company’s owners, Tal Fromchenko and Elad Yitzhak Peled, should be held personally liable.

The woman claimed that her broker, a man who called himself “Samuel Bale,” told her that the trades she made on the online trading platform were “a sure thing, like picking up money from the floor.”

Peled and Fromchenko, a scion of the family that owns the Elite chocolate company, said in their defense that OptionRally had a license from the Belize Financial Services Commission. They also said that the plaintiff had signed a waiver acknowledging that trading binary options is high risk and there was a danger of losing all her money.

The pair further argued that OptionRally was owned by a company called TCM Investments incorporated in Belize, and that therefore Israel is not the right jurisdiction for her lawsuit. Furthermore, she had signed an agreement that any dispute with the company would be resolved by a court in Belize.

The plaintiff’s lawyer contended that TCM Investments was merely a shell company and that the Israeli company’s bankruptcy documents described the Israeli company as a “binary options company” and that its employees are described as having earned commissions on net deposits, suggesting that the Israeli company was the binary options company itself and not just a “service provider.’

Case 13095-09-18 An American woman and PorterFinance.com


Israeli attorney Lior Shaby (Facebook)

In September 2018 an American woman sued an Israeli company called JMRB Media, as well as its owners Ron Benharav and Jonathan Jason Maymon, for NIS 642,000 ($185,000).

The plaintiff, through her lawyer Lior Shaby, claimed to have been defrauded by a website called PorterFinance.com.

The defendants Benharav and Maymon denied any connection to Porter Finance and told the plaintiff that she was suing the wrong people. The case is ongoing and the next court hearing will take place on December 22.

Case 31398-08-18 A New Zealand man and BossCapital.com

In August 2018, a New Zealand man sued the now-defunct Israeli company Rushmore Marketing and its owner Jonathan Siennicki for NIS 472,000 ($136,000) over losses he allegedly incurred to the website BossCapital.com.

The man was represented by attorney Lior Shaby. The defendants never mounted a defense and in April 2019 the judge ordered them to pay the plaintiff NIS 472,000 along with NIS 25,324 in legal fees.

Case 30417-12-18 A Dutch man and Tradorax.com

In December 2018, a Dutch man, represented by attorney Yoram Fay, sued Jack Henry Wygodski, Avi Itzkovich and Yael Fuks for 68,150 euros.

The three defendants were allegedly owners and executives of the websites TraderVC.com and Tradorax, which were run by a company called Rax Media OOD in Bulgaria. According to the lawsuit, Rax Media recruited Israelis and encouraged them to relocate to Bulgaria to work in its call center.

A private detective hired by the plaintiff spoke to ex-employees of the company undercover. One of them reportedly told her that employees of the Bulgarian call center sensed that law enforcement authorities had been sniffing around nearby.

The plaintiff and defendants ultimately settled the case out of court and the plaintiff withdrew the lawsuit, without being required to pay the defendants’ legal fees.

Case 16815-12-18 An Australian woman and 365binaryoption.com

A woman from Australia, represented by attorney Edith Millet Bar Oz, sued the Israeli company Paperclick Marketing Ltd. in December 2018 together with its owner Roy Shagan, for NIS 736,560 ($212,000).

The woman, a 59-year-old nurse, also sued her two brokers, who used the names “Tom Voss” and “Daniel Mor.” The woman said she had begun trading binary options after seeing an advertising campaign entitled “Fast Cash” featuring Sir Richard Branson.

Paperclick Marketing claimed in its defense that it merely provided services to Fintech Software, Inc., the British Virgin Islands company that owned 365binaryoption.com.

Paperclick Marketing’s owner, Roy Shagan, comes from a wealthy family and is a cousin of Shaul Elovich, the telecom magnate who is about to be indicted, along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on charges of bribery in the unrelated Case 4000.

On December 1, the plaintiff submitted an amended complaint, which named an additional man, Tommy Agami, as a defendant. The amended complaint alleged that Agami is the true identity of “Tom Voss,” the plaintiff’s broker.

Tommy Agami is an Israeli singer who together with his brother Yan appeared on the Israeli version of the television show “The X-Factor.” The plaintiff’s lawyer claimed to have discovered the identity of “Tom Voss” after obtaining an Excel spreadsheet that allegedly listed the names of Paperclick Marketing’s employees alongside the “stage names” they allegedly used when talking to customers.

In response to the amended complaint, the defendants’ lawyer suggested that the plaintiff may have come into possession of the Excel spreadsheet unlawfully, by somehow gaining access to the company’s internal communications. The defendants’ lawyer further cast doubt on the authenticity of the document and suggested it could have been created by someone wishing to harm the company.

Case 27768-10-18 A Czech woman and UKOptions.com

A 47-year-old Czech woman represented by attorneys Raouf Najjar and Adam Ashkenazi filed an NIS 233,966 ($67,400) lawsuit in Israel in October 2018. The woman sued Israelis Uri Katz and Adi Marom and the Israeli company UKFM Ltd.

The defendants have denied that they had anything to do with the company the woman allegedly lost her money to.

Case 52822-08-18 A Texas resident and StarlingCapital.com

An American man represented by attorney Yoram Fay has sued Silverpop Media Ltd. and Citrin Technologies Ltd., as well as Alexander Abdayev, Yishai Beserglick, Raz Beserglick, Karen Ronen, Luba Orman, Tali Kadosh, Itai Bar Ilan, Yosef Mizrachi and Amit Sides, for $275,000.

The plaintiff alleges that the defendants are owners and employees of two companies that operated the binary options website StarlingCapital.com.

The plaintiff alleged that Greymountain Management processed payments for Starling Capital. In addition, the plaintiff said he wired $150,000 to a company called Cutter International Limited in Dubai.

The defendants have all categorically denied that they had anything to do with the website StarlingCapital.com.

The Ukrainian Trail: The Binex Case and Kyiv’s Binary Options Offices

In 2018, Ukrainian law enforcement publicly demonstrated for the first time that schemes long associated with Tel Aviv, Limassol, or Sofia could just as easily operate out of Kyiv. Ukraine’s Cyber Police announced the shutdown of a Kyiv-based office linked to the binary options broker Binex, which investigators alleged had operated for years under the guise of a legitimate investment platform.

According to investigators, the scheme followed a familiar pattern. Prospective clients were shown supposedly “successful trades” on demo accounts, after which managers — often posing as financial consultants — persuaded victims to transfer increasingly large sums into “real” investment accounts. When investors later attempted to withdraw their funds, the process became delayed, obstructed, or altogether impossible. Authorities alleged that the operation functioned through a network of websites targeting clients in multiple countries.

The case highlighted an important reality: the binary options industry was never confined to a single country. Instead, it rapidly shifted across jurisdictions while preserving its core business model — aggressive sales tactics, psychological manipulation, and little to no realistic chance for clients to recover their money. That is precisely why the Israeli civil lawsuits matter today not only as a local legal story, but also as an effort to understand who stood behind an international web of “financial platforms” that operated for years across Israel, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Ukraine, and dozens of offshore jurisdictions.

Author: Mikhailo Shnaider