MLQ CAPITAL

Privacy Policy

This privacy notice explains how MLQ Capital Group collects and uses personal data, and describes the rights you have with respect to your personal data. In this notice, “MLQ Capital,” “our”, “we” or “us” refers to the global organization of the member firms of MLQ Capital Investments Group, each of which is a separate legal entity, or refers to one or more of those member firms.

This website uses analytics software to track its visitors and measure the website’s use.  The information gathered is not identifiable to any one person and is used solely to improve the quality of the information that we provide. 

MLQ Capital Group appreciates your visit to this website and your interest in our services and products. Your privacy is of utmost importance to us. To understand how MLQ Capital Group processes your personal data, please consult the documents outlined below. This Privacy Policy also applies when you interact with us offline. For example, this Privacy Policy applies if you provide your contact information to us, and to our ongoing dealings with you as a current, prospective or former client, investor, borrower, vendor, lender or sponsor.

This Privacy Policy forms part of our Terms and Conditions of Use at www.mlqcapitagroup.com. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully so that you understand our privacy practices. By providing Personal Information to us or by using the Site, you agree to be bound and abide by this Privacy Policy and our Terms and Conditions of Use, and you hereby consent to our collection, use, disclosure and other processing of your Personal Information in accordance with this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with our use of your Personal Information as forth in this Privacy Policy, you should not provide us with your Personal Information. However, if you do not provide us with certain Personal Information, or if you exercise any rights you may have to prevent us from using such Personal Information, we may not be able to do business with you. You may use the Site as a guest and are not required to register or create an account in order to use the Site or to explore our content.

General information

Data protection is an important concern for us. Therefore, we process your personal data (“personal data”) with great care and in accordance with the applicable legal requirements. MLQ Capital processes your personal data for different purposes and informs transparently about this data processing. Personal data” means any information that can be associated with an identified or identifiable natural person. The term “processing” includes any handling of personal data, e.g. obtaining, disclosing, storing, deleting, etc.

Please read the entire privacy policy carefully. This will tell you how and why we process your personal data and what rights you have in connection with this data processing. This privacy policy is based on the Swiss Data Protection Act (DSG). It is also based on the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). It depends on the individual case to what extent the GDPR is applicable at all.

PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT

The Personal Information we collect and otherwise process falls into two categories: (i) information you voluntarily provide us (or other external sources provide us) when you visit the Site and submit your information or otherwise interact with us both online and offline; and (ii) tracking information gathered as you visit the Site.

PERSONAL INFORMATION YOU PROVIDE

The types of Personal Information we collect and otherwise process about you depends on the product or service you have with us and the nature of our relationship with you. We may collect your Personal Information in various ways, including via email, telephone, videoconference, a Site contact form, as part of a transaction, and through other documents, forms, questionnaires and correspondence (such as your subscription agreement and related documents). Wherever reasonably practicable, we will endeavor to collect information about you from you personally.

We may collect the following categories of Personal Information about you:

This Privacy Policy, and the practices described herein, applies equally to our collection, use, disclosure and other processing of such “sensitive” Personal Information. In certain circumstances, we may combine Personal Information that you provide to us with Personal Information that we collect from or about you from such external sources. This may include Personal Information collected in an online or offline context.

PASSIVE INFORMATION COLLECTION & USE OF COOKIES


We may use analytics tools, including third-party services such as Google Analytics, to help us measure traffic, usage, and other trends based on your use of the Site.

These tools use various technologies, including cookies or similar technologies, to collect certain information sent by your devices to the Site, including:

  • Your browser name;
  • The pages you visit on the Site;
  • Whether you have previously accessed the Site;
  • The IP (Internet Protocol) address for your computer and other online identifiers;
  • The type of computer you are using and other technical information about your means of connection to the Site, such as the operating system, relevant plug-ins, and the Internet service providers utilized;
  • Navigational data, also known as log files, server logs or clickstream data; and/or
  • Other Internet or electronic network activity or information, such as browsing history and activities, search history, and other information regarding your interaction with the Site.
  • We conduct the passive collection of the above information in a variety of ways, including:
  • Through your browser or device. Certain information is collected by most browsers or automatically through your device, such as your Media Access Control (MAC) address, computer type (Windows or Macintosh), screen resolution, operating system name and version, device manufacturer and model, language and Internet browser type and version;
  • Through your use of the Site. When you visit the Site, we may track and collect the usage data, including but not limited to the date and time your device accessed the Site;
  • Using cookies. Cookies are pieces of information stored directly on the computer that you are using. Cookies allow us to collect information such as browser type, time spent on the Site, pages visited, language preferences, and other traffic data of the Site;
  • Using tracking technologies (i.e., to track you across third-party websites);
  • Using pixel tags (also known as web beacons and clear GIFs) and other similar technologies;
  • Using your IP address. Your IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to the computer that you are using by your Internet service provider. An IP address may be identified and logged automatically in our server log files whenever you access the Site, along with the time of the visit and the page(s) that were visited. Collecting IP addresses is standard practice and is done automatically by many websites, applications and other services.
  • If you connect to us from a social network, such as LinkedIn or Facebook, we will collect Personal Information from that social network in accordance with your privacy settings on that social network. The connected social network may provide us with information such as your name, profile picture, network, gender, username, user ID, age or age range, language, country, friends list, follower list, job title, and any other information you have agreed it can share or that the social network provides to us.
  • If you do not want information collected through the use of cookies, you may choose to set your web browser to refuse cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. However, if you do not accept these cookies, you may experience some inconveniences in your use of the Site and some parts of the Site may not function properly. We do not currently respond to “do not track” signals or other mechanisms that might enable users to opt out of tracking on the Site.
  • We may block certain IP addresses if they attempt to access the administrative portions of the Site without authorization.

Purpose of Data Processing and Legal Bases 

We primarily use collected data to enter into and fulfill contracts with our clients and business partners, particularly in relation to providing financial services to our clients and procuring products and services from our suppliers and subcontractors. We also process personal data to comply with domestic and foreign legal obligations. 

Additionally, in accordance with the applicable law and where appropriate, we may process personal data for the following purposes, which are in our (or, where applicable, third parties’) legitimate interest: 

  • Providing and developing our products, services and websites, apps and other platforms in which we are involved. 
  • Communication with third parties and handling their requests (e.g., job applications, media inquiries).  
  • Advertisement and marketing (including event organization), provided that you have not objected to the use of your data for this purpose (if you are part of our client base and you receive advertisement, you may object at any time, and we will add you to a blacklist to stop further advertising mailings). 
  • Asserting legal claims and defending against legal disputes and official proceedings.  
  • Prevention and investigation of criminal offenses and other misconduct.  
  • Ensuring the smooth operation of our IT systems, websites, apps, and other devices. 
  • Acquisition and sale of business divisions, companies, or parts of companies, and other corporate transactions involving the transfer of personal data. This includes measures for business management and compliance with legal and regulatory obligations, as well as internal company regulations. 

If you have provided us with your consent to process your personal data for specific purposes (for example when registering to receive newsletters), we will process your personal data within the scope of and based on this consent, unless we have another legal basis if one is required. You have the right to withdraw your consent at any time, but this does not affect the processing of data that occurred prior to the withdrawal.  

Collection and Processing of Personal Data 

We primarily process personal data that we obtain from our clients, business partners, and individuals in the context of our business relationships. Additionally, we collect data from users when operating our websites, apps, and other applications.  

Where permitted, we may acquire certain personal data from publicly accessible sources (e.g., debt registers, land registries, commercial registers, press, internet) or receive such information from affiliated companies of MLQ Capital, authorities, or other third parties. In addition to the data provided directly by you, the categories of data we receive from third parties include, but are not limited to: information from public registers, data received in administrative or court proceedings, information related to your professional role and activities (e.g., to conclude and fulfill contracts with your employer), information from correspondence and discussions with third parties, information provided by individuals associated with you (family, consultants, legal representatives, etc.) to conclude or process contracts with your involvement (e.g. powers of attorney), information regarding legal regulations such as anti-money laundering, bank details, information about you from media or internet sources (in specific cases, e.g. job applications, media reviews, marketing/sales, etc.), your address, and data related to your use of our websites (e.g., IP address, MAC address of your smartphone or computer, device and settings information, cookies, date and time of visit, accessed content and sites, used applications, referring website, localization data). In principle, we retain this data for 12 months after the completion of the processing purpose. However, this retention period may be extended if necessary for evidentiary reasons or to comply with legal or contractual obligations. 

HOW WE USE PERSONAL INFORMATION

We use Personal Information about you, including the “sensitive” categories of Personal Information described above in the section entitled “Personal Information you Provide”, for various purposes, including:

  • To provide our products and services, including to establish and administer any investment or loan and/or provide general financial advice or information about our products and services;
  • To provide the specific services you request, including to manage your investments or loans, administer investment- and lending-related activities, conduct transactions and send you related information, including any confirmations and receipts;
  • To fulfill our contractual obligations, including pursuant to your subscription agreement (if applicable);
  • To manage and administer customer services, including the administration of your customer account;
  • To communicate with you about MLQ Capital, including our events, news and information we think will be of interest to you, and for other marketing purposes;
  • For insurance purposes, as necessary;
  • For our recruitment, when you apply for a position with us;
  • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, such as to enforce our Terms and Conditions of Use and for financial and credit checks, audit requirements, fraud and crime prevention and detection, record keeping, monitoring and background checks, including to comply with ‘know your client,’ anti-money laundering and sanctions-related legal and regulatory obligations. This may include automated checks of Personal Information you or your organization provide about your identity against relevant databases, and contacting you to confirm your identity, or making records of our communications with you for compliance purposes;
  • For internal administration and analysis and other everyday business purposes;
  • To operate, protect the security of and manage access to the Site and our premises, IT and communication systems, online platforms, and other systems;
  • To prevent and detect security threats, fraud or other criminal or malicious activities; and/or
  • To fulfill any other purposes related and/or ancillary to any of the above, or any other purposes for which your Personal Information was provided to us, consistent with the commitments made in this Privacy Policy.
  • In addition to the above, we also use the Personal Information we passively collect about your use of the Site in a variety of ways, including:
  • For security purposes;
  • For purposes such as calculating usage levels of the Site, helping diagnose server problems, and administering the Site and its associated services;
  • To recognize your computer to assist your use of the Site;
  • To track the actions of users of the Site to improve the Site and its associated services, including to facilitate navigation and display information on the Site more effectively; and/or
  • To ensure that the Site and its services function properly.

We do not use or otherwise process your Personal Information, including your “sensitive” Personal Information, for purposes of automated decision-making, including profiling. We do not use or otherwise process your “sensitive” Personal Information other than as described herein.

HOW WE SHARE PERSONAL INFORMATION

We do not sell, trade, or rent your Personal Information to third parties, or share your Personal Information with third parties for purposes of cross-context behavioral advertising. We may share your Personal Information with our affiliates in connection with servicing accounts and to otherwise fulfill the purposes described in the section entitled “How We Use Personal Information” above. We may share your Personal Information with our service providers and other third parties that we partner with to assist us in various functions, including provide technological support, perform security and anti-fraud services, provide you with our services and products on our behalf.

These service providers and other third parties, which have access to your Personal Information only to perform specific tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use your Personal Information for any other purpose, can be classified in the following categories:

IT service providers, such as our data hosting provider and companies we employ to deliver and facilitate the services needed to support our business relationship with you, manage the Site, provide Site-related services and/or to assist us in analyzing how the Site is used; and

Other service providers that we may engage to provide services to us or on our behalf, including administrators, accountants, auditors, bankers, prime brokers, insurers, lawyers, AML service providers, placement agents, transfer agents, financial advisors, tax information service providers and other back-office service providers.

We also may share your Personal Information with third parties, including law enforcement, government agencies and regulatory authorities, in order to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, such as pursuant to a court order, if such disclosure is otherwise necessary in support of any criminal or other legal investigation or proceeding or to relevant tax authorities in response to their request. In addition, we may share your Personal Information with a third party or its advisors in connection with a potential or actual sale, merger or other disposition of all or part of our business or assets or any other corporate transaction (such as a financing or restructuring) involving such third party. We may use third-party services such as Google Analytics to collect, monitor, and analyze information as described in the section entitled “Passive Information Collection & Use Of Cookies” above. Those third-party service providers have their own privacy policies addressing how they use such information.

PERSONAL INFORMATION RETENTION

We will retain your Personal Information for a period no shorter than as required by our regulatory obligations and applicable law, and no longer than is reasonably necessary for our relevant business purposes in accordance with applicable law. You may be entitled to request further information regarding such retention periods, which you can do by contacting us as described in the “Contact Us” section below.

HOW WE PROTECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We take the protection of your Personal Information very seriously. We seek to use security measures designed to reasonably protect against unauthorized access, alteration, disclosure or destruction of your Personal Information under our control. However, the Internet and the storage and transmission of electronic information is not completely secure or error free. We cannot guarantee that your use of the Site, or the information stored on our or our service providers’ servers or transmitted via email, will be completely safe or secure, and we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information you provide to us. We do not accept liability for unintentional disclosure. We encourage you to use caution when using the Internet.

By using the Site or providing Personal Information to us, you agree that we may communicate with you electronically regarding security, privacy, and administrative issues relating to your use of the Site. If we learn of a breach or attempted breach of any of our or our service providers’ systems, we may attempt to notify you electronically by posting a notice on the Site or sending an email to you. You may have a legal right to receive this notice in writing, safety and security of your information also depends on you. Where you have chosen an account password for access to certain features of the Site, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask that you not share your password with anyone and encourage you not to use the same password on the Site as you use on other websites. In addition, links on the Site may take you to third-party websites over which we have no control. While such links are provided for your convenience, you should be aware that the information handling practices of the linked websites might not be the same as ours. You should review any privacy policies on those linked websites. We are not responsible for any linked websites.

Duration of data storage 

Your data, which includes personal data, will be processed and stored only for as long as necessary to fulfil our contractual and legal obligations or for the purposes stated in the data processing activities. This may include the entire duration of the business relationship and beyond, based on legal retention requirements and documentation obligations. It is possible that personal data will be retained for the time in which claims can be asserted against our company and insofar as we are otherwise legally obliged to do so, or if legitimate business interests require it (e.g. for evidence and documentation purposes). Once your personal data is no longer required for the above-mentioned purposes, it will be erased or anonymized, to the extent possible. For operational data (e.g. system protocols, logs), shorter retention periods of 30 days or less apply.  

Data Security 

We have taken appropriate technical and organizational security measures to protect your personal data against unauthorized access and misuse. These measures include issuing instructions, training, IT and network security solutions, access controls and restrictions, encrypting passwords, data storage devices and transmissions, pseudonymization and controls. We cannot guarantee the security of data transmission over the internet. When transmitting data by email, there is a certain risk of access by third parties. 

SSL or TLS encryption

We do our utmost to protect your data as best we can and to close security gaps as far as we can. An important protection mechanism is the SSL or TLS encryption of our website, which ensures that data you transmit to us cannot be read by third parties. You can recognize the encryption by the lock icon in front of the Internet address entered in your browser and by the fact that our Internet address begins with https:// and not with http://.

EEA AND UK PRIVACY RIGHTS

This section supplements the information contained in the rest of this Privacy Policy and describes certain rights residents of the EEA and the UK have with respect to their Personal Information(2) pursuant to the GDPR and the UK GDPR, as applicable and as described in this section. For purposes of the GDPR and the UK GDPR, Antares Capital LP is the controller of such Personal Information. For the purposes of this section, “Personal Information” has the meaning given to the term “personal information” in the GDPR and the UK GDPR, as applicable.

OUR BASES FOR PROCESSING YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We may process your Personal Information in connection with any of the purposes set out above on one or more of the following legal bases:

  • Because it is necessary for us to do so to perform your instructions or another contract with you or your organization, such as your subscription agreement and/or its constitutional and operational documents;
  • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations (such as compliance with anti-money laundering and FATCA/CRS requirements), as well as to keep records of our compliance processes or tax records;
  • To establish, exercise or defend our legal rights for the purposes of legal proceedings;
  • Because the processing is necessary for our legitimate interests, provided that those interests are not overridden by your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms; and/or
  • Because you have expressly given us your consent to process your Personal Information in that manner.

Sharing Data with Third Parties and Transfer of Data Abroad 

In the context of our business activities and in line with the purposes of the data processing outlined above, we may transfer data to third parties, insofar as such a transfer is permitted and deemed appropriate for them to process the data on our behalf or for their own purposes. In particular, the following categories of recipients may be concerned:    

  • Our service providers (e.g. Risk Management & Compliance, IT-Provider)  
  • Domestic and foreign authorities, official bodies and courts 
  • Other parties involved in potential or ongoing legal proceedings 
  • Certain Recipients are located within Switzerland, but others may be located in any country worldwide. In particular, you must anticipate your data to be transmitted to any country in which our firm is represented by affiliates, branches or other offices as well as to other countries where our service providers are located. 

If a recipient is located in a country without adequate statutory data protection, we require the recipient to commit to data protection compliance (for this purpose, we use the revised European Commission’s standard contractual clauses, which can be accessed here: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dec_impl/2021/914/oj?), unless the recipient is subject to a legally accepted set of rules to ensure data protection, or unless we cannot rely on an exception. An exception may apply for example in case of legal proceedings abroad, overriding public interest, contractual disclosure requirements, your consent, or if data has been publicly available and you have not objected to its processing. 

Disclosure and international transfer of your information

Our processing of your Personal Information may involve transferring your Personal Information outside of the EEA or the UK, including to countries (such as the United States) which may not offer the same standard of protection for Personal Information as countries within the EEA or the UK. Whenever we transfer your Personal Information outside of the EEA or the UK to countries that have not been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for Personal Information by the European Commission and/or the relevant public authority in the UK, as applicable, we seek to ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by, where required by the GDPR or the UK GDPR, using specific contracts approved by the European Commission or the relevant public authority in the UK.

YOUR RIGHTS

In accordance with and as far as provided by applicable law, you have the right to access, rectification and erasure of your personal data, the right to restriction of processing or to object to our data processing, in particular for direct marketing purposes, for profiling carried out for direct marketing purposes and for other legitimate interests in processing in addition to right to receive certain personal data for transfer to another controller (data portability). Please note, however, that we reserve the right to enforce statutory restrictions on our part, for example if we are obliged to retain or process certain data or if we have an overriding interest (insofar as we may invoke such interests) or need the data for asserting claims.  

We have already informed you of the possibility to object/withdraw consent at any time. Please be aware that exercising your rights may have implications for your contractual obligations and this may result in consequences such as premature contract termination or associated costs. If this is the case, we will inform you in advance unless it has already been contractually agreed upon.  

In general, exercising these rights requires that you are able to proof your identity (e.g., by a copy of identification documents where your identity is not evident otherwise or can be verified in another way). In order to assert these rights, please contact us via the details provided above.  

CHANGES IN OUR PRIVACY POLICY

We may change this Privacy Policy at any time, and we may provide you with notice of such changes through one or more of our channels. We encourage you to review this Privacy Policy whenever you interact with us to stay informed about our privacy practices.  Any changes will become effective when the revised Privacy Policy is posted on the Site and will apply on a go-forward basis. Your use of the Site following these changes means that you accept the revised Privacy Policy. For information on how we take care to protect your personal data collected, processed and used during visits to this and other integrated MLQ Capital Group websites (“MLQ Capital Group Websites”), including specific information on tracking technologies we use such as cookies or tags, please read our Website, and Cookie Notice.

By accessing MLQ Capital Group Websites, you accept our Website, and Cookie Notice. If you do not agree with the Website, and Cookie Notice, please do not proceed to MLQ Capital Group Websites.

This statement as well as the notices outlined above may be updated from time to time.