Mark Francis McCabe, of Roseville, NSW, has pleaded guilty in the Downing Centre District Court at Sydney to three offences of dishonestly obtaining a financial advantage by deception contrary to s192E(1)(b) of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) (Crimes Act), with a further four offences to be taken into account on sentencing.

Mr McCabe dishonestly obtained a financial advantage between October 2015 and May 2020 of $940,350 from eight victims, seven of who were former clients of Guevara Capital Access (GCA) (Deregistered) and/or Online Trading Capital (OTC) (Deregistered). Mr McCabe was the sole director of both companies.

The dishonest and deceptive representations made by Mr McCabe to investors included that he (through GCA and/or OTC) would provide ― and had provided ― investors with access to foreign exchange trading accounts with access to “capital” funds (in these accounts in specific amounts) to trade in a profit share arrangement on a trading platform provided by a third party.

Contrary to the representations made to investors, Mr McCabe only provided “test” accounts which were not capable of placing real foreign exchange trades. Investors used these “test” accounts to conduct what they believed to be genuine trading; however no actual trading took place.

Instead of using payments made by investors to pay for funded foreign exchange trading accounts, or to engage in trading on their behalf, Mr McCabe misappropriated the investors’ funds and used them for his own benefit to pay for business and personal expenses, such as rental payments, private school fees and various credit card purchases.

This matter is being prosecuted by the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (Cth) after a referral by ASIC.

The matter has been listed for mention on 1 November 2024 at which time it is expected a sentence hearing date will be fixed.

Background

The maximum penalty for an offence of dishonestly obtaining financial advantage by deception under s192E(1)(b) of the Crimes Act is 10 years imprisonment.