Offshore Litigation Blog

The rise of digital assets and cryptocurrency has transformed financial markets, but it has also raised novel legal and practical challenges, particularly in the context of corporate insolvency.

In Target Global Growth Fund II v Liu Xun, the Grand Court of the Cayman Islands granted the Plaintiffs’ application for a worldwide freezing injunction against the Defendant’s assets up to a value of US$35 million, as well as a proprietary injunction targeting specific assets.

In a significant ruling for cryptocurrency litigation, the English Court of Appeal in BSV Claims Ltd v Bittylicious Ltd dismissed the Applicant’s appeal against Binance and other crypto exchanges in proceedings arising out of the alleged anti-competitive delisting of Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (BSV) in 2019.

In a recent landmark decision, the Singapore High Court in Re Taylor, Joshua James and another (Official Receiver, non-party) addressed the treatment of unclaimed cryptocurrencies during the liquidation of Eqonex Capital Pte Ltd, a digital asset exchange operator.

The jurisdiction of the Cayman and BVI courts to adjudicate claims depends upon whether the defendant(s) to those claims can lawfully be served with originating process.

The anonymity which digital currencies and online trading more generally permit is one of the factors which makes the digital space so attractive to those seeking to perpetrate fraud. The claims that have come before the courts of England and Wales involving digital assets have almost exclusively been fraud cases. In these cases, the courts have generally taken a pragmatic approach, permitting such actions to be begun against the unidentified fraudsters as “persons unknown” and granting freezing and disclosure orders to assist in securing and recovering (so far as possible) the proceeds of the fraud.

Perhaps inevitably given the exponential growth in the value of the crypto market in recent years, courts all over the world are now tasked with resolving an increasing number of crypto-related disputes. Within the context of crypto recovery claims, this has invariably required the court to grapple with the underlying blockchain technologies.

The BVI has significantly developed and promoted its role in international arbitration in the last decade.

The title of this article might accurately describe the alien encounter and possibly out-of-body experience that some have faced when trying to understand digital assets, particularly cryptocurrency, and whether they are considered property.

In a recent matter our firm obtained Norwich Pharmacal relief against a centralised digital asset exchange, marking an important first step in the effort to recover misappropriated digital assets. While the Grand Court did not issue a formal judgment, it made several noteworthy observations that may influence the future handling of similar cases.

In a helpful decision for creditors of distressed crypto-platforms, the Singapore Court has clarified in Aaron Loh Cheng Lee and another v Hodlnaut Pte Ltd …

In a recent decision, AQF v XIO, VQF and CGN (made ex parte), the BVI Commercial Court (BVI Court) not only imposed a freezing order against the unknown scammers, but also ordered a mandatory interim injunction against the issuers of the relevant cryptocurrency (Issuers) to assist a victim of an “address poisoning” scam. Significantly, the Court granted the Applicant’s application for an order for service out of the jurisdiction on the unknown scammer by way of non-fungible token (NFT) airdrop to their digital wallet addresses, a first in the BVI.