CFTC v. Traders Domain FX LTD., Fredirick Safranko and others (ponzi schemes, 2024)

Alleged — pending

These are allegations. CFTC has filed an action; nothing in it has been proven, and the respondents have not been found liable. Everything described on this page is what the regulator alleges, not what a court has found. See our editorial policy.

✓ Checked against the primary document on October 4, 2026. The library's summary, tags and figures for this record were compared with the regulator's own document by an AI model (Claude) following written instructions, with sampled and disputed records read a second time. No lawyer has reviewed them. A checked record can still contain errors, and checked does not mean endorsed. See how we check records or report a correction.

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In October 2024 the CFTC charged Traders Domain FX LTD., Fredirick Teddy Joseph Safranko and 14 others. The complaint charges a group of companies and individuals with fraud and misappropriation in a scheme in which more than 2,000 customers deposited at least $283 million, described in the headline as a Ponzi scheme; a statutory restraining order froze defendants' assets on 3 October 2024. In April 2026 a consent order resolved the claims against one defendant, John Fortini ($1,347,867.56 disgorgement); the action continues against the others.

The record

What was ordered

Civil penalty

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Disgorgement

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Prejudgment interest

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Total relief

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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 October 15, 2024 as release 8997-24. The complaint charges a group of companies and individuals with fraud and misappropriation in a scheme in which more than 2,000 customers deposited at least $283 million, described in the headline as a Ponzi scheme; a statutory restraining order froze defendants' assets on 3 October 2024.

This library tags the matter as a Ponzi scheme because the document describes returns to earlier investors paid from later investors' money, as alleged or found. The tagging is ours, not the regulator's: agencies charge statutory provisions, not technique names.

The claims remain allegations except where a court order, described below, has resolved them.

Partial outcome. CFTC release 9213-26 (April 15, 2026) reports that the Southern District of Florida entered a consent order against one of the sixteen defendants, John Fortini, an executive of Algo Capital LLC, ordering disgorgement of $1,347,867.56, a permanent injunction and permanent trading and registration bans, and says the order resolves all claims against Fortini while the action continues against the remaining defendants. Fortini is not among the lead defendants named in this record. An earlier release, 9083-25 (June 3, 2025), set a July 28, 2025 deadline for customer claims and describes the case as continuing litigation. We found no outcome for Traders Domain FX Ltd., Safranko, Negus-Romvari or the other defendants on the CFTC pages we checked on 2026-10-04, so the matter stays recorded as filed and no amounts are stored in the structured fields.

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.

• Ponzi schemes — see how it works, what statute it engages, and every other action tagged the same way.

Timeline

1. 2024-10-15 CFTC release published
2. 2025-06-03 CFTC notes the case is continuing and sets a July 28 claims deadline (release 9083-25)
3. 2026-04-15 CFTC announces consent order resolving claims against John Fortini only (release 9213-26)

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
• CFTC order or complaint
• CFTC order or complaint
• CFTC release 9083-25 (claims deadline, case continuing)
• CFTC release 9213-26 (Fortini consent order)

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.

Related actions

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

Record added September 10, 2026. If this matter has since resolved, been withdrawn or been dismissed, we want to know: submit a correction.