FSA: Cloned firm boiler room fraud on the rise

Boiler rooms, which are unauthorised businesses, usually contact people by telephone, using high pressure sales tactics to con them into buying non-tradable, overpriced or even non-existent shares. The FSA said they were able to appear more credible by cloning genuine, authorised firms. The regulator received 449 reports about cloned firms, up from 161 in 2010, while the overall number of boiler room scam reports was up from 4,527 to 5,401. However, the number of actual victims who went on to invest in the schemes was down from 831 to 770, on average parting with approximately £20,...