Securities Regulation Daily Wrap Up, ENFORCEMENT—E.D.N.Y.: Federal court orders N.Y. man to pay over $3.4M for orchestrating forex fraud scheme, (Aug 13, 2025)

By Suzanne Cosgrove

The court also sanctioned Daniel Winston LaMarco for his misconduct in making defamatory and false allegations against the CFTC and its counsel through pleadings and letters.

The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York has entered a $3,450,400 final judgment against Daniel Winston LaMarco of New York that comprises $862,600 in restitution to LaMarco’s fraud victims and a $2,587,800 civil monetary penalty. The judgment also permanently enjoins LaMarco from engaging in conduct that violates the Commodity Exchange Act, as charged, and it permanently bans him from engaging in any commodity-related activity (CFTC v. Lamarco, No. 2:17-cv-04087-DG-JMW (E.D.N.Y. July 14, 2025)).

According to a CFTC release, the final judgment follows rulings by U.S. District Court Judge Diane Gujarati, including:

• A July 10, 2025, order adopting the report and recommendation issued by Magistrate Judge James Wicks in favor of the CFTC’s motion for remedies and final judgment against LaMarco;

• A September 4, 2024, order adopting the report and recommendation issued by Magistrate Judge James Wicks in favor of the CFTC’s motion for summary judgment against LaMarco as to liability for forex fraud and commodity pool operator fraud; and

• A March 14, 2023, memorandum and order adopting the report and recommendation issued by Magistrate Judge James Wicks in favor of the CFTC’s motion for default judgment against LaMarco’s company, GDLogix, Inc., on all counts in the complaint including fraud and failure to register as a commodity pool operator.

Enforcement action resolved. The court’s final judgment and orders resolve the CFTC’s enforcement action filed on July 10, 2017, which charged LaMarco and GDLogix, Inc. with fraudulently soliciting and accepting $1,492,650 from pool participants to trade forex contracts in a commodity pool the defendants operated.

As alleged, most of the pool participants were LaMarco’s friends and acquaintances. He lost nearly all their funds through unsuccessful trading in his personal account and by diverting $630,050 of the total principal to some pool participants as purported “profits” in a Ponzi scheme.

False claims of profits. LaMarco, an independent software consultant, is currently in federal prison in Manhattan, New York. On August 19, 2016, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York charged LaMarco with one count of wire fraud and one count of commodities fraud. The government alleged that from January 2011 through March 2016, LaMarco, individually and as agent and officer of GDLogix, fraudulently solicited and received funds from a commodity pool made up of 13 individual investors who invested approximately $1,492,650 with LaMarco in the pool.

LaMarco solicited participants by falsely representing to them that he was a profitable trader and touting the alleged safety of his margined or leveraged retail foreign currency. But LaMarco omitted material facts in his solicitations to actual and prospective pool participants, including failing to disclose that he was misappropriating participants’ funds, that no trading took place on behalf of participants, and that he was losing money trading retail forex in his personal accounts. LaMarco provided potential participants with a document entitled “GDLogix Memorandum of Offering,” which indicated that participants’ money would be placed in the pool operated by GDLogix.

This is CFTC Release No. 9107-27.

Attorneys: Danielle E. Karst for the CFTC. Daniel Winston LaMarco, pro se.

Companies: GDLogix Inc.

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