Futures Firm, Others Liable in Currency Fraud

International Financial Services Inc. of New York and others were ordered to pay $100 million for defrauding currency-futures investors, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission said.

John Walker Robinson, former IFS president, and Chan Kow Lai, an IFS director, were also “personally liable for the wrongdoing,” Judge Gerard Lynch of the Southern District of New York said in an order of final judgment, posted on the CFTC website Monday. The commission originally filed a complaint in July 2002.

IFS “routinely misled and lied to customers about the prospect for profits and the status of their accounts,” the court said. “At bottom, IFS Inc. rigged the market to ensure that, with few exceptions, its customers would lose their money to itself” and Sociedade Comercial Siu Lap Limitada, a clearinghouse in Macao.

Siu Lap is named as a relief defendant, meaning it must return any profit it made as a result of wrongdoing by IFS.

Louis Burke, a lawyer representing IFS, and Ronald Kliegerman, an attorney who represents Lai, didn’t immediately return calls seeking comment.