Cheques and Balances: Former Forex.com and Invast Director Sentenced Over Suspected Scam Proceeds

Brendan Gunn has been sentenced in the Local Court of NSW for dealing with more than AU$180,000 when it was reasonable to suspect the funds were proceeds of crime.

He received 12 months' imprisonment, to be released immediately upon entering a $3,000 recognizance requiring good behaviour for 12 months. The maximum penalty for a summary prosecution of this offence is 12 months.

Banks Flagged Suspicious Activity Repeatedly

From December 2018, Gunn served as a director of Mormarkets, which traded as Coinshype and received deposits from Australians for cryptocurrency and other purported investments. Between January 2019 and May 2020, 22 separate bank accounts were opened in Mormarkets' name across six financial institutions.

On several occasions, banks told Gunn they had received complaints that funds credited to Mormarkets accounts were linked to fraud or suspicious activity.

All accounts tied to the company were eventually closed by the banks.

When two of those accounts were shut, Gunn received two bank cheques covering investment amounts totalling AU$181,000. He then sent the cheques to an associate.

He pleaded guilty in January 2026 to dealing with money reasonably suspected of being proceeds of crime, following a guilty plea Finance Magnates reported on at the time, which also detailed how he continued opening new accounts after banks flagged suspicious activity.

ASIC Chair Sarah Court said Gunn ignored clear warnings, including customer complaints made to Mormarkets' banks, about money linked to suspected scam activity, and that by continuing to deal with those funds he helped move money taken from Australians.

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A Career Rooted in CFD and Forex Brokerages

Gunn's route into Mormarkets followed a long run in Australia's CFD and forex industry. He spent six years at GAIN Capital's Forex.com brand, serving as Director of Global Client Services for Asia-Pacific from 2006 to 2013.

In 2013, Japanese broker Invast Securities recruited him to establish and lead its Australian subsidiary, where he secured the unit's AFSL licence from ASIC and built a sales team of more than 25 people as CEO of Invast Financial Services until 2015. He was later briefly associated with GMT Markets in 2018 before joining Mormarkets.

ASIC said the sentencing forms part of a broader effort to disrupt scams, including coordinating the removal of more than 25,000 scam and phishing websites since 2023.

Quarterly data from ScamWatch and ReportCyber recorded 60,657 scam reports and $248.3 million in losses in the first three months of 2026. The regulator's other recent actions include a $35 million penalty against HSBC over scam protection failures and the cancellation of Capital Guard's AFS licence over a fake bond sale.