Platforms · Software · Providers · Markets
A U.S. Federal court has entered a default judgment against Michael B. DePetrillo, Meteor LLC and NOLA FX Capital Management LLC, concluding the CFTC's civil case over the NOLA FX Fund.
The court resolves civil enforcement
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana imposed a $9,211,492 civil penalty. It also permanently barred all three defendants from trading in markets regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), or registering with the agency. The ruling follows DePetrillo's nine-year prison sentence in July 2025, when the court ordered him to pay victims $6,748,412 in restitution. He pleaded guilty in February 2025.
Investor money funded false returns
Investors were told their contributions would be combined in the NOLA FX Fund to trade leveraged currency contracts. The Justice Department said approximately $9.2 million came to DePetrillo from around 55 investors during a seven-year period. The court found that more than $3 million had been diverted, including to pay participants, cover DePetrillo's personal expenses and trade through his own accounts. False account statements portrayed the fund as profitable.
Other cases remain unproven allegations
The CFTC has also brought cases involving pools presented as trading operations. In August, it sued Goliath Ventures, alleging the company took at least $397 million for cryptocurrency trading and issued statements reporting non-existent profits. The following month, the regulator sued Cash FX Group, claiming it collected more than $950 million for a purported forex pool, carried out little trading and used incoming deposits to pay earlier participants. Those claims remain allegations. The DePetrillo judgment is at a later stage, as Finance Magnates reported.
- Civil penalty: $9,211,492.
- Victim restitution: $6,748,412.
- Market and registration restrictions: permanent for all three defendants.
What an operations team should check
The judgment does not identify a trading platform or back-office system. Operators reviewing pooled FX arrangements should ask whether investor statements reconcile with executed trades, cash balances and withdrawals. What records independently support reported performance, and who can change those records or approve payouts?
Those checks follow from the conduct described in the case, but the report does not establish that a specific vendor, integration or migration is involved. The practical review is of control ownership and evidence trails: how contributions are tracked, how payments are funded, and how reported trading activity can be verified.
