Second, the activity he carried out was carried out on a trading platform supervised by the Australian authorities, and the activity was carried out transparently, clearly and openly with no intention of defrauding; and that he did not deceive the account holders, and if he had such an intention, he would have taken his clients' money, which there is no claim that was done.
Third, the defendant never imagined that his activity was contrary to the law, nor did he receive any indication from the INA or any other regulatory body that there was any problem with his activity, even though the activity was open and known to all.
Fourth, the sums that the defendant earned as a result of his activity were negligible. For assistance in opening the account, installing the robot and assisting in its operation, he was paid by the account holder a sum of US$100 and for each client she brought, Preston received US$100. In addition, the defendant was supposed to receive a certain percentage of the profits in the accounts, but in practice most of the accounts did not make a profit, and in the accounts he earned the amount he received is small. Therefore, we are dealing with trivial matters. The defendant further claimed that "there may have been errors and mistakes" in his actions and that his actions were out of "stupidity," as he put it, but they were on a small scale that did not justify the filing of the indictment, and certainly did not constitute fraud and malice.
Fifth, with regard to offenses involving the management of cases without a license - the defendant claimed that there was no case management in his activity and that he did not know or imagine that the activity he carried out was in the form of portfolio management; this is evidenced by the fact that he publicized his activity and no party warned him that there was a problem with his activity or that he should stop it. According to the defendant, the first time he received a notice from the NRA was when he was detained for interrogation after its interrogators identified themselves as clients.