Does this offer seem legit?

[Locke]

Hey everyone,

I'm an undergraduate student moving onto my junior year, and a small prop firm called Highland Stone Capital is offering a job as a junior currency trader for the summer with no experience required. They say I get 80/20 split (80% to me) with no fee to cover computer/software expenses. In addition, they'll teach me the ropes for about a month before letting me on my own, and even then, the senior trader will cap my daily losses so I can't wash out on the first day.

The catch is, I have to pay $5000, in which $3500 goes in as insurance/risk coverage for the company, while 1500 goes to paying for a two-day, 10-6:00 training course.

I've never applied to a prop firm before, so I'm not sure if paying for training is reasonable or a red flag. What do you guys think regarding the legitimacy of the offer? Thanks a lot for any of your help!

-Locke

 

[demoship]

If you have to pay $1500 for a 2 day "training" course, then it's a scam.

You can't learn how to trade fx in 2 days, at least not profitably.

The whole thing sounds suspicious as hell.

 

[gptrader]

Just ask them how long until you can withdraw your $3500. Are they going to hold it for a year? DON'T do it if the answer is a year. You may find fx is not for you and you can't move money elsewhere.

 

[Rearden Metal]

Quote from Locke:

Highland Stone Capital is offering a job as a junior currency trader...

No, they're not offering you a 'job' at all... You'd be their client, not their employee. If they had the audacity to call this a "job", run the other way! Only the shadiest of firms would try that trick.

Secondly, forex is by far the worst trading instrument of all.
You won't meet many people who can make a consistent living trading forex. Hell, I've been a professional trader for 12 years, and I've never met <b>even one</b> such individual in all that time.

 

[operator]

Besides the stuff listed above (except I do know a few people making some nice money trading FX-def. can not overtrade) I would not sign up with a firm that doesn't even have their phone # and address on their website http://highlandstonecapital.com/contactus.aspx. That in itself would keep me far away.

 

[demoship]

this is also really suspicious:

http://highlandstonecapital.com/tradingsystem.aspx

Anyone who can call signals that damn good won't be giving you 80% of the profit to trade em.

And yeah, the contact us page is sketchy too, any real financial firm w/ a website will list the address of their headquarters at minimum.

 

[Locke]

Wow thanks everyone, I didn't realize how sketchy the offer actually was. I guess the excitement of getting trading experience on my resume really did cloud my judgment. Thanks once again for the advice!

-Locke

 

[Maverickz]

A good rule of thumb: if you think for even a split second that something is a scam....it probably is.

 

[TraderZones]

About their website:

Domain Name: HIGHLANDSTONECAPITAL.COM
Registrar: MELBOURNE IT, LTD. D/B/A INTERNET NAMES WORLDWIDE
Whois Server: whois.melbourneit.com
Referral URL: http://www.melbourneit.com
Name Server: NS1.OFFICELIVE.COM
Name Server: NS2.OFFICELIVE.COM
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Updated Date: 28-aug-2007
Creation Date: 30-aug-2006
Expiration Date: 30-aug-2008

Are you in Australia?

Also, they get a Google page Rank that is 0/10, which has an odor to it. They are certainly a newbie or unimportant in the scheme of things

 

[Robert Weinstein]

Quote from Mom0/pH0x:

i was an market maker for an fx house. the short answer is no. don't do it.

While the offer doesn't seem to pass the smell test for me I would say that if Momo says its a bad deal you can bank on it.

You can buy a lot of books/videos for $1500.

I have never traded FX (have traded Currency futures) because it appears to me to be about the hardest way to make money trading. Your going against traders with huge amounts of knowledge(some legal and some not legal) and huge players that have the inside track like governments etc.....

For $1000 you can go to the three day training in vegas at bright trading. Probably learn as much or more and bright has been doing it for a long time so there must be some value in it or the naysayers on ET would never shut up about how bad it is. (i have no relation to bright trading and I have not been to their training)

Best of luck to you