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Risk Warnings EU
Risks due to regulatory, legal and tax uncertainty
Risks related to technology, BEU/third party service provider software and systems
Use of affiliates & conflicts of interest
Separately negotiated agreements
These Risk Warnings relate to your access to and use of the Services made available to you by BEU.
Any capitalized terms not separately defined shall have the meaning given to them in the applicable terms and conditions.
Please note that BEU only offers trading services to professional clients in the meaning of the German Securities Trading Act (Wertpapierhandelsgesetz – “WpHG”) and assumes that these clients have sufficient knowledge and experience to determine the risks inherent to trading digital assets. These risk warnings shall provide you with additional information. In any case, you remain responsible for taking care to understand the technological, economic and legal nature of digital asset products and for carefully managing your exposure in accordance with that understanding and your risk appetite for innovative, volatile and speculative new technologies and assets.
Laws and regulations vary from country to country and it is your responsibility to ensure your compliance with such laws and regulations. You should sufficiently inform yourself of the various risks involved in using the services and make your own decisions based on your personal risk appetite. All information provided by BEU is for information purposes only, unless stated otherwise. BEU is not providing any legal, tax, accounting, financial or investment advice or recommendation, and nothing provided to you should be relied upon as such. You should consider your personal situation carefully and/or consult your independent professional advisors (including legal, tax, accounting, financial and investment advisors) before participating in any services offered by BEU.
These Risk Warnings are a non-exhaustive list of potential risks associated with the products and services that BEU may make available to you. You should also consider any other factors (such as local laws and requirements in your jurisdiction) which may not be listed below that are relevant to your circumstances and place of residence or operation. Some or all of the services may not be available in your jurisdiction or place of residence or may be restricted to certain types of sophisticated or qualified investors.
Where relevant, the issuers or promoters of digital assets may provide their own information in relation to functionality and risks of those digital assets. BEU takes no responsibility for the accuracy or completeness of such information.
Product risk
Digital asset products generally: digital assets and related products (collectively referred to in these Risk Warnings as digital asset products) are high risk products. You should exercise caution.
Nature of digital assets: Digital assets are not legal tender. A digital asset you own may or may not be considered “property” in legal terms under the laws of a particular jurisdiction. They may not be backed by physical assets or any official currency, and are not backed or guaranteed by a government. They may not have intrinsic value. Certain digital assets may not circulate widely, and may not be widely listed on secondary or other markets. Digital assets for which BEU offers trading services to its customers may no longer be available for trading in the future due to e.g. regulatory requirements.
Further product-specific risks: BEU does not issue digital assets. Digital assets may be issued by third parties or may be distributed decentrally via a blockchain network without any issuer involved. If available, you should read carefully applicable product terms, product information, whitepapers and risk disclosures provided by an issuer of a digital asset (if the crypto asset has an issuer) or available otherwise on the internet for a digital asset you may wish to trade before entering into an order for any digital asset product. However, please note that there may not be any applicable terms and/or whitepaper for each digital asset you may wish to trade.
Subject to any applicable terms and other documents of each digital asset (for example, whitepapers), the issuer (if the crypto asset has an issuer) may change the purpose or use of the digital assets or the overall project, without any notice. Such changes may also occur, and regardless of whether the crypto-asset in question has an issuer, if the underlying protocol is changed by the participants of the respective blockchain network in accordance with the rules of that network. Any such changes (including addition of new types of digital assets) may impact the overall risks of the digital asset. You should monitor the developments of each digital asset carefully.
In any case, no product term or product information on crypto assets has been reviewed by BEU and such terms and information has typically not been subject to regulatory approval, unless expressly stated otherwise. You should exercise caution in respect of any such information.
For any digital asset products that have been authorized by a regulator, authorization does not imply any official recommendation or endorsement of the product by the regulator, nor does it include any risk assessment or guarantee the commercial merits of a product or its performance. You should seek independent professional advice before making any investment decision.
Complex products: Digital asset products may be complex products by virtue of the fact that the terms, features and/or risks are not readily understood due to the complex structure, novelty and reliance on technological features.
Private keys: The transfer of a digital asset is controllable only by the possessor of the unique private key relating to the wallet address where such asset is held and a transfer of digital assets can be triggered by any person possessing such unique private key. Private keys must be safeguarded and stored securely in order to prevent an unauthorized third party from accessing the respective assets held in such wallet. Regarding any wallet address in your control and from which you may want to deposit or to which you may want to withdraw digital assets, you alone (and/or any third-party service provider used for that purpose) are responsible for securing your private key. Losing control of your private key will permanently and irreversibly deny you access to your digital assets. Neither we nor any other person will be able to retrieve or protect your digital assets in this case. Once lost, you will not be able to transfer your digital asset to any other address or wallet. You will not be able to realize any value or utility that the digital asset may hold now or in future.
Our holding of private keys: We, or our third party service providers, as applicable, hold all digital assets in custody in two types of wallets: (i) hot wallets, which are managed online, and (ii) cold wallets, which are managed offline.
We cannot eliminate the risk that private keys and backups are lost, destroyed, unable to be accessed by us or our subcustodians or third party service providers or otherwise compromised, which means we will be unable to access the digital assets held in the related hot or cold wallet.
Further, we cannot provide assurance that any of the wallets used for custody of your digital assets will not be hacked, compromised, or subject to security breaches or malicious activities such that digital assets are sent to one or more addresses that we or our third party service providers do not control, which could result in the loss of some or all of the digital assets that are held in custody on behalf of customers. Any loss of private keys relating to, a hack or other compromise of, hot wallets or cold wallets used to store our customers’ digital assets could result in partial or total loss of customers’ digital assets or adversely affect our customers’ ability to sell or withdraw their assets. The nature of digital asset product transfers is that they are irreversible. This means that losses due to fraudulent, accidental hacking and technology risks and transactions may not be recoverable. The risk is increased for the digital assets that are held in hot wallets due to their ongoing connection with the internet and increased risk of hacking.
Subcustodian risks: Subject to any legal and regulatory requirements, we might engage subcustodians and other third parties to, as the case may be:
a. hold the supported digital assets or supported fiat currencies in custody in a segregated client account maintained by the subcustodian or third party bank;
b. provide the back-end infrastructure and related services that we use to hold the supported digital assets you deposit in that segregated client account; and/or
c. to perform certain of our other duties, obligations, and rights under the applicable terms of service or in connection with the Services we provide.
There is a risk of loss arising from the use of back-end infrastructure and related services provided or maintained by our subcustodians or other third parties we may engage. We attempt to protect ourselves and you by requiring our custodians and other third party service providers to adhere to the applicable terms of service and applicable law, that are intended to reduce the risk of loss, but there can ultimately be no assurance that such measures will be entirely successful to avoid loss.
We conduct periodic reconciliations with other market participants (which may be BEU affiliates or third parties) to account for trades made among market participants of the BGI Exchange and their customers, including us trading on the BGI Exchange. There is a risk that should a market participant become insolvent prior to completion of reconciliation, or otherwise be prevented from completing a reconciliation, there will be a mismatch between your account balance and the digital asset products and fiat currencies held by BEU in custody for you. This could result in a delay in you receiving digital asset products and fiat currencies reflected in your account balance or even partial or complete loss of such digital asset products or fiat currencies.
While we will use commercially reasonable efforts to mitigate this risk, and to attempt on your behalf to recover any amounts due, there is no assurance such efforts by us will be successful, or that any recovery will be obtained promptly or in full, and you are exposed to the resulting risk of loss. If you do not wish to accept this risk, you should consider not to open an Account or access the Services.
No deposit protection: You should be aware that:
a. any order may be not subject to a right to claim under any investor compensation fund established by any government or regulatory body; and
b. any digital asset products are not protected deposits, and may not be protected by any deposit protection scheme.
Digital asset products or fiat currencies in your account are protected in accordance with the applicable terms of service and applicable law. This means that digital asset products and fiat currencies have a different level and type of protection compared to other products and asset classes. This applies irrespective of the nature of the digital asset products or fiat currencies.
Trading and market risk
No advice on Transactions: BEU does not advise on the merits or risks of any particular transactions, or tax consequences. Nothing that we or our representatives provide, such as (without limitation) market commentary, newsletters, educational materials, or market data or information, are, and none of them should be construed as, a recommendation, endorsement financial advice, solicitation or offer to sell, purchase or subscribe for any digital asset products and/or services offered by BEU or any third party. You should consult your financial, tax or other advisors. Any decision to transact in any digital asset product is your decision and neither BEU nor any of its affiliates or related parties will be liable to you for any loss suffered unless otherwise provided in our terms of service.
Order types: you should be aware that only certain types or orders are available using the Services. Time in force parameters can be defined for both limit orders and stop limit orders. Stop limit orders can be used to provide some protection against trading losses as such orders are only filled when the stop price is reached and then only at or better than a specified price. It is important to note that the closer the stop price is to the specified price, the greater the possibility that the order will not be fully filled. This should be contrasted with stop market orders (which are not available) which would be fully filled from the available liquidity. It is your responsibility to understand the differences between each order type, and your sole responsibility to determine if and when a particular order type should be used.
Volatility and liquidity risks: Users should be aware that the market for digital asset products is relatively new and is subject to very significant volatility and liquidity variations. Digital asset products may have unique features that make them susceptible to substantial fluctuations in value, and to date a significant amount of trading has been driven by speculation. These fluctuations may decrease or increase the value of your portfolio at any given moment and in some cases the value of any specific digital asset product may even fall to zero over a short period of time, which could result in a total loss of your investment. The value of digital asset products can go down or up and there is a substantial risk that you could lose some or all of your investment when transacting in digital asset products.
You should carefully consider whether transacting in digital asset products is suitable for you in light of your financial position. Many factors, some known and others unknown, including (without limitation) supply and demand, the activity of other exchanges, the actions of regulators and governments around the world, and many others, may have a significant impact on prices for digital asset products. There is a risk that material losses will arise to you and market participants as a result of volatility, liquidity constraints and speculation, among many other factors. You should ensure that you take all these risks into account when trading digital asset products, including the amount of a transaction, the frequency of trading and any stop loss limits. If you feel uncomfortable with the risks or your Account position you should consider reducing or eliminating your exposure or seeking independent expert advice. You are solely responsible for forming your own views or consulting your professional advisors as to the advisability of any particular trade or transaction, and you bear all risk of loss in connection therewith. The value of a digital asset may be derived from the continued willingness of market participants to exchange fiat currency for such digital asset, which means that the value of a particular digital asset may be completely and permanently lost should the market for that digital asset disappear. There is no assurance that a market for a particular digital asset product will continue to exist in the future.
There is the possibility for you to experience losses due to the inability to sell or convert assets into a preferred alternative asset immediately or in instances where conversion is possible but at a loss. Such liquidity risk in an asset may be caused by the absence of buyers, limited buy/sell activity or underdeveloped secondary markets, which are beyond our control. There is no assurance that a person who accepts a digital asset as payment today will continue to do so in the future.
Trading: When you trade using the Services, we will place corresponding orders on the BGI Exchange and only confirm orders that can be matched correspondingly on the BGI Exchange. The BGI exchange is operated by an affiliate of BEU. Regarding the use of affiliates, please refer to the section “Use of affiliates” below.
You are solely responsible, and we accept no responsibility whatsoever for, and shall in no circumstances be liable to you in connection with your decisions, including your decision to trade at the price you choose.
You are solely responsible for forming your own views or consulting your professional advisors as to the advisability of a particular trade, and you bear all risk of loss in connection therewith, subject to our Terms of Service. If you do not wish to enter any particular trade, or are unable or unwilling to bear the risks, you should consider not to engage in digital asset trading
Risk of market abusive techniques: Due to their largely unregulated nature of digital asset products (at a product-level) and comparatively early-stage status, digital asset product markets and trading are also susceptible to actual or alleged manipulation. For example, false or misleading trading activity can be conducted on unregulated trading, lending or other dealing platforms for the purpose of manipulating the price of certain digital asset products. These can result in the markets for digital asset products being especially vulnerable to fluctuation.
As well as being regulated and prohibiting such behaviors using our Services, BEU adopts a number of preventative controls and procedures to prevent the risk of market abuse and risk of market manipulation.
Commissions and fees: Before conducting any Transaction, you should obtain details of all commissions, fees and costs for which you will be liable. If any of the fees and costs are not clear to you, you should request the fee and costs that will be applicable in specific monetary terms before entering into a Transaction. Depending on the Services provided, such fees and costs will be set out in the relevant Transaction confirmation, in writing via our agreed method or otherwise recorded in your Account.
Risks relating to authorized users: There are substantial risks in allowing another person to trade or operate an Account, and it is possible that Instructions that you did not intend to give could be given by persons who are not properly authorized.
Risks due to regulatory, legal and tax uncertainty
Regulatory uncertainty: The laws applicable to blockchain technology and digital assets will vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and may evolve and it is your sole and exclusive responsibility to obtain your own legal, accounting and tax advice in respect of these matters.
Legal and regulatory treatment varies according to the jurisdiction. Different jurisdictions may apply different legal categorization of digital assets, characterizing them as, for example, currency, commodities, virtual currency, virtual commodity, or other property or instruments. Some jurisdictions may restrict or ban digital asset-related activities. The effect of regulatory and legal risk is that any digital asset may decrease in value or lose all of its value due to legal or regulatory change. This may affect:
a. the use, transfer, exchange and value or potential profit of a trade; and
b. the enforceability of your interest in such a digital asset.
Subject to the terms of service confirmed by you and without intending to change any clause of such terms of service with the following information, we would like to point out:
We may cancel or modify your order, restrict or suspend your use of the Services or your Account to comply with applicable law or for other reasons as specified in the applicable terms of service. We may also cease to offer a digital asset product for trading, in particular if its legal and regulatory treatment changes. Depending on your country of residence, you may not be able to use all of the Services and functions offered by BEU. It is your responsibility to comply with the rules and laws in your country of residence and the country or jurisdiction from which you access the Services. We reserve the right to modify, vary, limit, suspend, discontinue, or terminate the Services in any jurisdiction at any time based on our assessment of the applicable laws, regulations, and governmental policies in that jurisdiction.
You should note that in certain circumstances, such as where there has been a breach of our terms of service or suspicious activity is detected, BEU may suspend your Account in accordance with our terms of service until such time as the matter has been adequately resolved or appropriate action has been taken. In certain circumstances, BEU may be required to report suspected illegal activity to applicable law enforcement agencies.
Overseas laws (for Customers Outside Germany): Assets received or held by us may be subject to applicable laws and regulations different from your country or residence., and such assets may not enjoy the same protection as that conferred on some of the assets received or held in your jurisdiction.
Activities relating to digital asset products may also be subject to legal or regulatory restrictions or requirements in different jurisdictions, failure to comply with which may result in your personal liability or imposition of fines. Therefore, you should check the position in your jurisdiction and seek professional advice if you are unsure. Neither BEU nor any of its affiliates or related persons makes any representation as to the appropriateness of digital asset products as an investment or to the availability and/or liquidity of the same in your jurisdiction. You should consult your professional advisor in your jurisdiction before making any decision to invest, or otherwise deal, in digital asset products and you acknowledge and agree you do so at your own risk.
Increased regulation of digital asset product markets: Many trading, lending or other dealing platforms, custodians, and other services and markets relating to digital asset products are presently unregulated in many jurisdictions. However, substantial additional regulation of digital assets services and markets is underway and may be imposed at any time in the future. The application of local laws and regulations in a variety of jurisdictions to digital asset products also remains largely untested, and is subject to change, sometimes without notice. In particular, any current governmental or regulatory tolerance of, or expectations in relation to, certain activities can change rapidly. Multiple consultations are on foot worldwide, with very different lead times. Action may be taken by regulators and/or government bodies in relation to certain digital asset products. As a result of such events, the absolute or relative value, as well as the availability of, certain digital asset products may change. This could impair the liquidity of any relevant digital asset product market or restrict your and/or our access to such market. You may suffer a loss as a result.
Tax treatment and accounting: Some digital asset products and orders may be subject to the tax laws and regulations in an applicable jurisdiction. The tax treatment and accounting of digital asset products and orders (and any ancillary benefits) is a largely untested area of law and practice that is subject to changes. Tax treatment of digital asset products and orders may vary amongst jurisdictions. We may receive queries, notices, requests or summons from tax authorities and as a result may be required to furnish certain information about the order. If you are unsure about the tax implications of your orders, you should seek independent professional advice before carrying out an order.
Risks related to technology, BEU/third party service provider software and systems
Dependence on software and systems, failures, outages and disruptions: We rely on technology and telecommunications infrastructure, including (without limitation) the internet, mobile services, cloud infrastructure and data centers, to conduct much of our business activity and to allow our customers to conduct transactions using the Services. Our services rely on software, including software developed or maintained internally and by third parties, that is highly complex. There may be delays between your initiation of a transaction and its execution.
Our systems and operations, as well as those of the third parties on which we rely to conduct certain key functions, are vulnerable to disruptions from natural disasters, power and service outages, interruptions or losses, downtime, computer software and hardware and telecommunications failures, software bugs, cybersecurity attacks, hacking, or other intrusions, computer viruses, malware, distributed denial of service attacks, spam attacks, phishing or other social engineering, ransomware, security breaches, credential stuffing, technological failure, human error, acts of war, terrorism, improper operation, unauthorized entry, data loss, intentional bad actions and other similar events. If any of our systems, or those of our third party service providers, are disrupted for any reason, our products and services may fail, resulting in unanticipated disruptions, slower response times and delays in trade execution and processing, failed settlement of trades, incomplete or inaccurate accounting, recording or processing of trades, unauthorized trades, loss of customer information, increased demand on limited customer support resources, or other issues. The software on which we rely may contain errors, bugs or vulnerabilities, and our systems are subject to capacity limitations.
Some errors, bugs or vulnerabilities inherently may be difficult to detect and may only be discovered after code has been released for external or internal use. Many of our systems are relatively new and may interact with one another in unanticipated ways. Errors, bugs, vulnerabilities, design defects or technical limitations within the software on which we rely may lead to negative customer experiences (including the communication of inaccurate information to customers), compromised ability of our products to perform in a manner consistent with customer expectations, compromised ability to protect the data (including personal data) of our customers, or an inability to provide some or all of our Services, or may be exploited by malicious actors.
As our customer base grows, we may experience surges in trading volume, which may cause our systems to exceed capacity constraints or operate at diminished speed or even fail, temporarily or for a more prolonged period of time, which would affect our ability to process transactions and potentially result in some customers’ orders being executed at prices they did not anticipate or executed incorrectly, or not executed at all. Several digital asset trading providers, platforms and exchanges have experienced outages resulting in their customers being unable to buy and sell digital asset products and some customers experiencing downgraded service. Our services may in the future experience such outages from time to time. We may also choose to limit the number of customers who may access our Services at any one time to protect the performance of our systems. This may result in you being unable to place an order, deposit or withdraw digital asset products or fiat currencies, or take any other action at the time of your choosing. Disruptions to, destruction of, improper access to, breach of, instability or failure of our information technology systems or the external technology or systems of third parties with whom we do business that allow our customers to use our Services could lead to you being unable to use any or all of our Services. Subject to our Terms of Service, we make no warranty that the Services will always be available or uninterrupted, timely, secure, not subject to downtime or outages, free of viruses and vulnerabilities, or otherwise error-free. The effect of the above may mean that, for reasons beyond our control, you may be prevented from accessing or transferring your assets.
Any liability suffered by customers by us will be determined in accordance with our terms of service.
Forks: Any user of an open source blockchain can download the software, modify it and then propose that other users and miners of that blockchain protocol adopt the modification. When a modification is introduced and the community decides to adopt the modification, the change is implemented via an update to the software and the blockchain protocol networks, as applicable, may continue in operation uninterrupted. However, if part of the community rejects the proposed modification, and the modification is not compatible with the software prior to its modification, the consequence would be a fork (i.e. a split) of the impacted blockchain protocol network with one group running the pre-modified software and the other running the modified software. The effect of such a fork would be the existence of two separate versions of the blockchain protocol network, operating simultaneously but incompatible with one another, and with each network’s native token or digital asset unable to operate on the other’s network. A fork can lead to a disruption of the relevant blockchain networks and our information technology systems, cybersecurity attacks, replay attacks or security weaknesses, any of which can lead to temporary or even permanent loss of the digital assets we hold for users.
In the event of a fork, we will need time to evaluate the fork’s impact on our operations and to determine our response, and we have the rights and obligations set out in our terms of service.
Other blockchain-related risks: While we assess which digital assets will be made available for trading by also analyzing the risks of the underlying blockchain network, we do not control the underlying blockchain network required for the digital assets to function. There are blockchain-related risks which are outside of our control and which should be considered when trading with digital assets. These risks can also affect our ability to transact with you, including any deposits or withdrawals. In case a blockchain is (temporarily) unavailable, this can lead to slower processing of transactions, including delays in any trades, deposits or withdrawals.
Other blockchain-specific risks include, inter alia.
- so-called 51%-attack (an attack on a blockchain by a group of miners who control more than 50% of the mining hash rate to manipulate the network).
- the risk of flooding a network with a large number of transactions in a short time – so-called DDoS attacks. As a consequence, this can lead to transactions being processed with a delay. This could lead to inadequate settlement processing by the Applicant; or
- the risk that participants in the blockchain network underlying a particular digital asset will make changes to the network’s specifications in accordance with the rules set by the network. Depending on the specific change, such changes may, in particular, have a material adverse effect on the value of a digital asset or on its tradability.
Cybersecurity breaches or attacks: The transmission of information electronically can be subject to attack, interception, loss or corruption. In addition, computer viruses and malware can be distributed and spread rapidly over the internet and could infiltrate our systems or those of our customers or third party service providers. The services’ reliance on the Internet exposes you to a risk of fraud or cyber-attack. Your assets, an account, a wallet, a service, an agreed communication method or a trading tool may be targeted by malicious persons who may attempt to steal your assets, or otherwise intervene in the order or any of the markets. The nature of digital assets and the reliance on the Internet and blockchain technology means they may be exposed to specific and increased risks of fraud and cyberattacks.
Infiltration of our systems or those of our customers or third party service providers could in the future lead to disruptions in systems, accidental or unauthorized access to or disclosure, loss, destruction, disablement or encryption of, use or misuse of or modification of confidential, sensitive or otherwise protected information (including personal data) and the corruption of data. In addition to traditional computer hackers, malicious code (such as viruses and worms), employee theft or misuse and denial-of-service attacks, sophisticated nation-state and nation-state-supported actors now engage in attacks (including advanced persistent threat intrusions). A vulnerability, error, bug, or other defect in our or a third party service provider’s software or systems, a failure of our or a third party service providers’ safeguards, policies or procedures, or a breach of our or a third party service provider’s software or systems could result in the compromise of the confidentiality, integrity or availability of our systems or the data housed in our third party solutions. Although we have internal processes and technological measures in place to protect our systems and data and typically enter agreements relating to cybersecurity and data privacy with our third party service providers, we cannot guarantee that such measures or agreements will prevent the accidental or unauthorized access to or disclosure, loss, destruction, disablement or encryption of, use or misuse of or modification of data (including personal data), will prevent damage to, or interruption or breach of, our information systems, data (including personal data) and operations, or enable us to obtain adequate or any reimbursement from our third party service providers in the event we or they should suffer any such incidents. In addition, our and our third party service providers’ remediation efforts may not be successful in anticipating, preventing, detecting or stopping attacks, or reacting in a timely manner.
Account login notifications: if you opt-out of account login notifications, you may not be aware or be notified of unauthorized access or trading in respect of your Account. If you opt-out, BEU will not notify you of unauthorized access or dealings with your Account.
Targeting by malicious persons: Malicious entities may target you in an attempt to steal any asset that you may hold, or to claim any asset that you may have purchased. This may involve unauthorized access to your Account, your private keys, your addresses, your passwords, your email or social media accounts, your log-in details or access method for the Account, as well as unauthorized access to your computer, smartphone and any other devices that you may use.
You alone are responsible for protecting yourself against such actions.
The protocols, networks, systems, and other technology (including any blockchain or comparable technology) relating to any digital asset may include coding errors which may mean that they do not function as intended and may cause catastrophic failures. Forks, upgrades, software bugs, or a change in consensus mechanisms or how transactions are confirmed, among other factors, may have unintended adverse effects on the corresponding digital asset. Digital assets and their underlying technology may be vulnerable to attacks on their security, integrity or operation, including, without limitation, attacks using computing power to overwhelm the normal operation of a blockchain or its consensus mechanism and maliciously tamper with transactions (e.g., “double spending” attacks). A digital asset may be lost, double spent, lose its developers, miners/validators, or user community, or may otherwise lose all or most of its value, whether because of forks, attacks, bugs, changes to the features, characteristics, or properties of the digital asset, or failure of the digital asset to operate as intended, or any other reason.
Reliance on third parties: In providing the Services, BEU relies upon certain third party computer systems or third party service providers, cloud infrastructure providers, internet service providers, payment services providers, market and third party data providers, regulatory services providers, clearing systems, financial institutions, banking systems, communications facilities and other facilities to provide our Services, facilitate trades by our customers and support or carry out certain regulatory obligations. These providers are susceptible to operational, technological and security vulnerabilities, interruptions, or business disruptions, including (without limitation) security breaches, which may impact our business or our ability to provide the Services, and our ability to monitor our third party service providers’ data security is limited. If a third party service provider ceases their operation, there may be an impact to BEU operations. In addition, these third party service providers may rely on subcontractors to provide services to us that face similar risks. An interruption in or the cessation of service by our third party service providers or their subcontractors, or deterioration in the quality of their service or performance, could be disruptive to our business and your ability to access any or all of the Services. Any contractual protections we may have from our third party service providers may not be sufficient to adequately protect us against such adverse consequences, and we may be unable to enforce any such contractual protections. In particular, if the Market is suspended or unavailable, you may not be able to place any orders. Our liability, if any, for any loss suffered due to such suspension or unavailability is determined in accordance with our terms of service.
Cryptographic advancements: Developments in cryptographic technologies and techniques, including (but not limited to) the advancement of artificial intelligence and/or quantum computing, pose security risks to all cryptography-based systems including digital assets, your Account, digital asset wallets, Notices and the systems we use to provide the Services.
Applying these technologies and techniques to digital assets, your Account, digital asset wallets, Notices, or our systems may result in theft, loss, disappearance, destruction, devaluation or other compromises of the affected digital asset, Account, digital asset wallet, Notice, system or your data. Our liability, if any, for any such loss is determined in accordance with our terms of service.
Use of affiliates & conflicts of interest
Affiliates of BEU are involved in the provision of the services to you. For example, BEU places orders exclusively on the BGI Exchange which is operated by an affiliate, Bullish (GI) Limited. Additionally, another BEU affiliate may act as a liquidity provider on the BGI Exchange, including by placing trades through automated market making instructions, and may earn a share of trading fees resulting from such trades. Potential conflicts of interest may arise by virtue of such relationships. BEU and its affiliates seek to prevent and manage all material conflicts of interest in accordance with applicable law.
In particular, BEU’s day-to-day business decisions, including the acceptance of its customers’ orders and the placement of corresponding orders, is taken independently and without influence of Bullish (GI) Limited or other affiliates. BEU’s management team is personally and operationally separate from the management team responsible for BGI Exchange or other BEU affiliates.
Generally, BEU’s order management and execution is based on a highly automated process and leaves only little room for manual intervention, mainly to enable BEU to comply with applicable law, including market abuse prevention, suspension of trades in case of money laundering or other suspicious activity. Only selected personnel have the possibility to influence order management in the first place, and strict supervision is in place.
Also, when executing orders BEU is required to comply with the market rules of BGI Exchange, which apply equally to all participants on the Exchange. The Exchange’s matching engine matches and fills orders according to price-time priority and does not discriminate between customers when doing so. BEU places corresponding orders for any orders received from its customers immediately in accordance with the Terms and Conditions, without prioritizing certain orders. This also means that orders submitted to BEU by specific persons cannot be prioritized in the first place.
BEU has implemented market abuse monitoring processes and tools as well as a strict conflict of interest policy and corresponding controls, including monitoring of e.g. personal transactions of employees and other relevant persons. Access to any sensitive (trading) information is highly restricted and based on the specific operational needs of relevant entities and personnel. Employees have a strict code of conduct and are required to notify responsible (compliance) personnel of any suspicions of conflicts of interest. Beyond this, employee remuneration at BEU is not predominantly based on quantitative commercial criteria but takes into account appropriate qualitative criteria reflecting compliance with applicable regulations, fair treatment of and the quality of services provided to Customers.
Supported digital assets
Under no circumstances should you attempt to use your BEU account to store, send, request, or receive digital assets in any form that we do not support. Such actions may lead to the permanent loss of your digital asset.
In accordance with our terms of service, BEU may decide to cease to make available any digital asset, or may cease to offer pairs on such digital asset as set out in out terms of service. This may mean that you will not be able to convert such digital asset into another digital asset or into fiat currencies but can only withdraw the digital asset. BEU may impose time limits on holding assets that we have ceased to make available in BEU accounts and may, in certain circumstances, require you to transfer such balances to your external wallets.
Separately negotiated agreements
From time to time, we and/or our affiliates may, subject to applicable law and as determined by us in our sole discretion, enter into separately negotiated arrangements with certain users that supplement certain of the economic or other terms of the applicable terms of service or the Policies, in each case solely as applicable to that user’s relationship with BEU, or such affiliate, and use of the Services. Any such separately negotiated arrangements will be entered into based on factors or considerations determined by us to be relevant in our sole discretion, and arrangements or terms offered to one user may not be available to all, or even any, other users. You do not have any claim against us or the user that receives additional or different rights or terms as a result of a separately negotiated arrangement, and the validity of or enforceability of the applicable terms of service or other policies entered into by and between you and us are not affected by the existence of or the terms and conditions of any separately negotiated arrangements we may have with any other user.
Suspension or termination
There are circumstances described in the applicable terms of service under which we may suspend or terminate your Account or any of the Services, in whole or in part, or your access thereto. We may also impose limits on the amount of fiat currency or digital asset products that you are able to withdraw from your Account, or suspend withdrawals, in particular as required under applicable law.
Insolvency risk
The financial situation of BEU may deteriorate and lead to the inability of BEU to meet its obligations or cause us to become insolvent. If this happens, we may be unable to meet our obligations to you and other users and you may suffer losses.
Unanticipated risks
Digital assets are a relatively new and untested technology. In addition to the risks set out in this statement, there are other risks associated with your acquisition, storage, transfer and use of digital assets, as well as the security risks associated with the use of a digital asset wallet, including those that BEU may not be able to anticipate. Such risks may further materialize as unanticipated variations or combinations of the risks set out above.
1 Section 67 (2) and (6) WpHG
