FOI 871/25

Request

I am writing to request information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

The purpose of this request is to gather data on reported investment scams and the outcomes of these reports, specifically how many resulted in convictions.

Note: For the purpose of this request, "investment scams" refers to fraudulent schemes where individuals are deceived into making financial investments that result in loss. This includes, but is not limited to: pension fraud, cryptocurrency scams, forex trading scams, boiler room schemes, fake bonds or shares, and any other deceptive investment opportunities promoted with the intent to defraud.

Specifically, I am seeking anonymised data on the following from January 2020 to July 2025:

The total number of investment scam reports received by your force, broken down by calendar year (2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and partial data for 2025).

Of these reports, the number of cases that have resulted in criminal convictions

Only if held, the details of those convictions, including:

Type of sentence (e.g., fine, custodial sentence)

Amount of any fine issued

Length of custodial sentences, where applicable

Response 

We consulted with our Crime & Criminal Justice department who have provided the below response to your request.

Please note the data provided in this response is NOT reflective of the total number of reported cases of investment fraud. South Wales Police does not hold that data. NFIB, the agency responsible for collation of all fraud reports, including investment fraud, will hold additional information regarding this request. Therefore, you may also wish to submit your request to NFIB.

South Wales Police will ONLY record investment fraud reports in very limited and specific circumstances:

• if the victim is vulnerable and requires safeguarding
• if the suspect is known and lives in the South Wales Police area

In most instances of investment fraud, the identity of the suspect is NOT known and the majority of the occurrences below have been recorded to safeguard the victim, rather than for a police investigation. Investment fraud reports outside of the above specific parameters are recorded with NFIB, not with South Wales Police.

Investment Fraud Data for 2020

16 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Investment Fraud Data for 2021

29 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Investment Fraud Data for 2022

19 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Investment Fraud Data for 2023

26 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Investment Fraud Data for 2024

21 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Investment Fraud Data for 2025 (Jan – June)

9 Investment Fraud Occurrences recorded

Please also note that investment fraud reports can be protracted investigations, and whilst there are no criminal convictions seen in the occurrences to date, a number are live investigations with police inquiries continuing or suspects awaiting court proceedings. 

In relation to the search conducted to arrive at these figures, there is no specific category on South Wales Police systems, so no easy way to identify investment frauds. Therefore, keyword searching has been used to identify such reports recorded under the crime categories:

• CR42 (fraud)
• CR45 (crime related)
• 50/N (reported to Action Fraud).

This search was conducted using the following keywords: invest, pension, crypto, forex, trading, boiler, bond, share, pyramid, ponzi. The results returned were reviewed to ensure relevance to the FOI request. The results retrieved are dependent on how the information has been entered onto the system. As such, the information provided should not be considered statistically accurate and/or definitive and therefore, care should be taken when using this data for any further statistical, analytical or evaluative purposes.