CFTC v. Cartu et al. (rigged binary options execution, 2020)

Judgment entered

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In 2020 the CFTC sued six individuals and four companies over the BeeOptions, Glenridge Capital, Rumelia and Blue Moon binary options brands. In March 2024 the Western District of Texas entered a default judgment against Jonathan Cartu, Leeav Peretz, Nati Peretz and Blue Moon Investments (US$51,155,645 and a US$153,466,935 penalty, recorded under the separate record for the CFTC's March 2024 release), and in 2023 a consent order against Ryan Masten and BareIt Media (US$100,000 penalty, the only money recorded here).

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

$100k

Disgorgement

—

Prejudgment interest

—

Total relief

$100k

Alleged gain

—

A dash means the release did not state a figure we could extract, not that the figure is zero. Penalty and disgorgement are stored separately so aggregates across the library do not double-count the same dollars.

What is alleged to have happened

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced this matter on September 2, 2020 as release 8231-20, bringing a civil case in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas against a group of six individuals and four companies. Named are David Cartu, Jonathan Cartu, Joshua Cartu, Leeav Peretz, Nati Peretz and Ryan Masten, together with BareIt Media LLC d/b/a SignalPush, All Out Marketing Limited, Blue Moon Investments, Ltd. and Orlando Union Inc.

Over nearly five years ending in April 2018, the three Cartu brothers are alleged to have run a retail binary-options operation under the BeeOptions, Glenridge Capital and Rumelia Capital names, staffed by call centers based mainly in Israel that pursued U.S. customers with promises of 60-to-85-percent returns while brokers lied about their credentials, pay, whereabouts and even their own names. What sets this complaint apart from an ordinary boiler-room pitch is what allegedly happened after a customer's money arrived: all of these brands ran on one shared internet platform, built and run by the Cartu brothers with Masten, and the complaint alleges that platform's owners actively steered the outcome of some customer positions toward a loss for their own benefit.

This library tags the matter as rigged binary options execution on the strength of that specific allegation: the platform did not merely misrepresent the odds, but controlled the outcome of transactions it operated.

A further allegation concerns the money itself: more than $165 million in card payments is alleged to have moved through an Irish entity, Greymountain Management Limited, that the Cartu brothers also controlled, while Masten's company SignalPush is alleged to have supplied trading signals and automated execution to customers without the registration the CFTC requires for that activity.

The allegations above are the CFTC's complaint; the findings below come from the court's later orders.

The release credits assistance from the Ontario Securities Commission, which had already brought its own proceeding against the Cartu brothers on behalf of more than 700 Ontario residents, and from regulators in Australia, Belize, Cyprus, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Malta, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

For the regulator's own account of the facts, read the primary document linked above. This page deliberately summarises the structured record rather than reproducing the release.

Outcome. The court's order of 10 March 2024 granted the CFTC a default judgment against Jonathan Cartu, Leeav Peretz, Nati Peretz and Blue Moon Investments, who did not defend after service by mail, publication and email. It awarded US$51,155,645 in restitution and a US$153,466,935 civil penalty, jointly and severally, with permanent injunctions, and closed the case. The CFTC's release says the order found the defendants offered illegal off-exchange binary options and manipulated some trades to cause customer losses. Separately, a consent order filed on 29 August 2023 resolved the claims against Ryan Masten and his company BareIt Media (SignalPush) for a US$100,000 penalty and a ban from acting as a commodity trading advisor without registration.

Money: to avoid counting the default judgment twice, its amounts are carried only by the sibling record for CFTC release 8877-24 (cftc-cartu-brothers-rigged-binary-options-execution-2024). The penalty recorded here is only the US$100,000 Masten consent penalty.

What the sources do not show: The CFTC's release calls the US$51,155,645 disgorgement while the order calls it restitution, so it is not entered in the disgorgement field. David Cartu, Joshua Cartu, All Out Marketing and Orlando Union are named in the original complaint; a 2022 magistrate recommendation proposed dismissing the three brothers for lack of personal jurisdiction, and this record did not confirm how each of those defendants was ultimately resolved.

What technique is this, and how does it work?

This action is tagged with one technique in our taxonomy. The tagging is ours: regulators charge statutory provisions, not technique names, so the mapping is an editorial judgement described in our editorial policy.

• Rigged binary options execution — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2020-09-02 CFTC civil enforcement action filed
2. 2023-08-29 Consent order against Ryan Masten and BareIt Media (US$100,000 penalty)
3. 2024-03-10 Default final judgment against Jonathan Cartu, Leeav Peretz, Nati Peretz and Blue Moon Investments; case closed
4. 2024-03-14 CFTC announces the judgment (release 8877-24)

Primary documents

Everything on this page derives from the documents below. Where our summary and the primary document disagree, the primary document is right.

• CFTC release 8231-20
• CFTC release 8877-24
• Order for final judgment by default (10 March 2024)
• Consent order, Masten and BareIt Media (29 August 2023)
• Magistrate's report and recommendation (2022)

The linked release is a work of the United States government and is not subject to copyright. Our summary and narrative above are our own writing.

Same matter

The library links these 2 records because they appear to concern one matter: the same lead defendant, an overlapping technique tag and close filing dates, or a shared court docket or a release that cites the other. Records are listed by date filed.

This grouping is the library's, made by matching names, techniques, dates and citations when the site is built. It is not the regulator's or a court's determination that the records are one case, and it errs towards missing a link rather than making a false one.

Related actions

Other actions in the library sharing at least one technique tag with this one.

Record added September 29, 2026. submit a correction.