9. Trading Activities and Related Risks

The purchase and sale of futures and options on futures contracts require margin deposits with FCMs. Additional deposits may be necessary for any loss on contract value. The CEA requires an FCM to segregate all customer transactions and assets from the FCM’s proprietary activities. A customer’s cash and other property (for example, U.S. treasury bills) deposited with an FCM are considered commingled with all other customer funds subject to the FCM’s segregation requirements. In the event of an FCM’s insolvency, recovery may be limited to a pro rata share of segregated funds available. It is possible that the recovered amount could be less than the total of cash and other property deposited.

The term “off-balance sheet risk” refers to an unrecorded potential liability that, even though it does not appear on the combined consolidated statements of financial condition, may result in future obligation or loss in excess of the amount paid by the Series for a particular investment. Each Trading Company and Galaxy Plus entity expects to trade in futures, options, forward and swap contracts and will therefore be a party to financial instruments with elements of off-balance sheet market and credit risk. In entering into these contracts, there exists a market risk that such contracts may be significantly influenced by market conditions, such as interest rate volatility, resulting in such contracts being less valuable. If the markets should move against all of the futures positions held by a Trading Company or Galaxy Plus entity in respect of any Series at the same time, and if the Trading Advisor(s) of such Trading Company or Galaxy Plus entity are unable to offset such futures interests positions, such Trading Company or Galaxy Plus entity could lose all of its assets and the holders of Units of such Series would realize a 100% loss. The Managing Owner will seek to minimize market risk through real-time monitoring of open positions and the level of diversification of each Trading Advisor’s portfolio. It is anticipated that any Trading Advisor’s margin- to-equity ratio will typically not exceed approximately 35% although the actual ratio could be higher or lower from time to time.

In addition to market risk, trading futures, forward and swap contracts entails credit risk that a counterparty will not be able to meet its obligations to a Trading Company or Galaxy Plus entity. The counterparty for futures contracts traded in the United States and on most foreign exchanges is the clearinghouse associated with such exchange. In general, clearinghouses are backed by the corporate members of the clearinghouse who are required to share any financial burden resulting from the non-performance by one of their members and, as such, should significantly reduce this credit risk. In cases where the clearinghouse is not backed by the clearing members, like some foreign exchanges, it is normally backed by a consortium of banks or other financial institutions. Some non-U.S. exchanges, in contrast to U.S. exchanges, are principals’ markets in which performance is the responsibility only of the individual counterparty with whom the Trading Company has entered into the transaction, and not of the exchange or clearing corporation. In these kinds of markets, there is risk of bankruptcy or other failure or refusal to perform by the counterparty.

In the case of forward contracts traded on the interbank market and swaps, neither is traded on exchanges. The counterparty is generally a single bank or other financial institution, rather than a group of financial institutions; thus there may be a greater counterparty credit risk. The Managing Owner expects the Trading Advisors to trade only with those counterparties which it believes to be creditworthy. All positions of each Trading Company will be valued each day on a mark-to-market basis. There can be no assurance that any clearing member, clearinghouse or other counterparty will be able to meet its obligations to any Trading Company.

The Managing Owner has established procedures to actively monitor and minimize market and credit risks. The Limited Owners bear the risk of loss only to the extent of the market value of their respective investments and, in certain specific circumstances, distributions and redemptions received.