Singapore’s Court of Appeals has ruled against the crypto exchange Quoine in a legal dispute against market maker B2C2 for wrongfully reversing seven Bitcoin trades.
Reported by The Straits Times, the ruling on Monday was made on an appeal by the exchange over a court’s decision against it last March.
A long-running legal battle
B2C2 first moved to court in mid-2017 against the reversal of seven trades by Quoine, which happened to be the first crypto-related legal dispute in Singapore.
The dispute was initiated over seven crypto trades placed by B2C2’s software, which involved the selling of Ethereum at a rate of 10 Bitcoins to one Ethereum - around 250 times higher than the market rate of about 0.04 BTC to 1 ETH at the time.
The proceeds of the trade were automatically credited to B2C2’s account as the corresponding amount of 309 ETH was debited.
Quoine learned about the trades the next day and promptly reversed all seven trades.
The plaintiff accused the exchange of breach of contract and breach of trust and moved to court to recover the involved 3,092 Bitcoin.
Though the Singapore International Commercial Court (SICC) has found the exchange operator guilty of wrongfully reversing seven crypto trades, Quoine appealed the decision on the premises that the transactions were a “mistake.”
In the recent ruling, the court pointed out that there were no mistakes in this case as to the terms of the trading contract, and even if it was reversed by mistake, the B2C2 software could not know if it was a mistake or intentional move, giving it an advantage.
Notably, four of the five judges on the bench ruled against Quoine’s appeal while one dissented on the judgment.
With the conclusion of the almost three-year-long dispute, the parties now have to conclude settlement proceedings as the value of the involved digital coins significantly changed over the years.
