P&D Brigade23 Apr 2026 17:39
I've just received this from Freetrade randomly. I know the experienced traders here would never be hood winked by the P&D Social Media crooks, but I just thought I would share this as we seem to be getting more and more vulnerable traders who fall prey to these people in this group. If it only helps a couple of people realise they are being played and used by others, then it was worth the post👍
We’re reaching out to all of our customers as we’ve seen a concerning rise in scams known as pump & dump schemes.
These scams are increasingly well-organised and sophisticated, and we want you to be aware of the risks.
How these scams typically work:
• Victims are enticed to join ‘investment advice’ groups through social media, commonly Instagram, Facebook, and Whatsapp.
• Fraudsters sometimes impersonate legitimate investment firms, wealth managers, or well-known public figures such as Martin Lewis.
• The scammers will share bogus investment advice in the groups, often providing detailed, but fabricated analysis on the stocks they are recommending.
• When recommending stocks, they will often include very high ‘expected returns’ or guaranteed profits.
• They often also request proof of your buy orders in the stocks they are recommending, and sometimes detail specific limit or stop loss orders that you should place.
• Once the scammers have convinced enough people to buy the stock and the price has become artificially inflated, they will sell their large positions causing the stock price to crash - typically far below the point at which victims bought their positions.
We are working closely with others in the market to monitor for stocks at risk of this sort of manipulation, and we will halt trading in cases where we have concerns.
Stop losses
We also wanted to highlight two points regarding stop loss orders, which are sometimes misrepresented by the fraudsters:
• Putting in place a stop loss does not guarantee the price you receive. In fast moving markets, you might receive a worse price than the price at which you have set your stop loss.
• If you have an active stop loss order for a particular stock, you will not be able to execute a market sell order until you have cancelled the stop loss order.
You can read more about these points in our FAQ and our Order Execution Policy.
It is also important to note that even after ‘dump’ has occurred, these scammers may persist in trying to extract money from their victims. This is often through further WhatsApp contact relating to recovering lost funds or offering access to VIP insights on their next recommended stock. This sort of communication should not be trusted.
If you believe you have been contacted about a ‘pump and dump’ scheme, please reach out to us so we can report it to law enforcement agencies.
Best,
Freetrade Team
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