ORLANDO, FL – December 7, 2010 – The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) secured a default judgment against Pedro de Sousa, Guillermo Rosario, and their company, FX Professional International Solutions, Inc., for a $4 million penalty related to a foreign currency (forex) fraud. The judgment, issued by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, found the defendants issued false account statements to customers.
According to the CFTC complaint filed July 13, 2010, de Sousa and Rosario allegedly solicited at least $535,000 from four customers to trade forex contracts through FXP. They falsely claimed FXP had annual trading profits ranging from 21% to 85% since 2002, with no losing years. However, the court found FXP did not exist prior to 2004.
The judgment also revealed that Rosario and de Sousa sent customers fabricated monthly account statements showing profits from 2005 through 2008. In reality, their forex trading resulted in losses for 31 out of 40 months during that period. The CFTC determined this constituted a deliberate attempt to deceive investors.
Simultaneous with the CFTC complaint, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested both de Sousa and Rosario on related criminal charges filed by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida. The specifics of those criminal charges were not detailed in the CFTC release.
The default order mandates that Rosario, de Sousa, and FXP jointly and severally pay a civil monetary penalty of $4,080,000. They are also permanently banned from trading on CFTC-regulated markets and from registering with the CFTC. Furthermore, they are prohibited from future violations of the Commodity Exchange Act’s fraud provisions. The CFTC acknowledged the assistance provided by the FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami throughout the investigation.
Source: CFTC.gov
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