Flourish

Separation between Flourish Cash and Flourish Crypto


Last updated: October 20, 2023

Estimated reading time: 2 minutes

 

Key takeaway: While Flourish Crypto1 and Flourish Cash2 are both offered by Flourish, they are offered by distinct legal entities, operate under different regulatory regimes, and are completely separate from a financial perspective. Clients depositing funds with Flourish Cash have zero exposure to Flourish Crypto; all customer deposits in Flourish Cash are held on deposit at our FDIC-member Program Banks, such as HSBC and PNC.

We launched Flourish Crypto in September 2021 to fill a gap in the financial advisor toolkit. Tens of millions of Americans were investing in crypto, yet there was an almost complete lack of products built for financial advisors and their clients. Flourish Crypto is a simple, secure, and compliant solution that opens up new opportunities for advisors, meets growing client demand, and facilitates visibility into more areas of clients’ financial lives for more holistic planning and risk management.

Recent volatility in the crypto market has prompted questions about the relationship between Flourish Cash and Flourish Crypto and we wanted to provide clarity about the distinction between our two core products.

Separate entities

Flourish Cash and Flourish Crypto are offered by completely separate entities.

Flourish Cash is offered by Flourish Financial LLC, a FINRA-Member broker-dealer. Customer funds are swept to our FDIC-member Program Banks,3 such as PNC and HSBC, where they are held on deposit, in cash. On every monthly statement, we state which banks are holding customer funds.

Flourish Crypto is offered by Flourish Digital Assets LLC, a commodity broker-dealer registered with the New York Attorney General, with custody and execution of trades handled by Paxos Trust Company, regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services as a trust company. Unlike many other crypto solutions, Flourish Crypto only allows clients to buy, sell, and hold crypto – there are no features like margin trading, staking, or futures within the product offering. Customer assets are held bankruptcy remote. Read more in our statement on Flourish Crypto security.


Independent Solutions

While both Flourish Cash and Flourish Crypto roll into the same parent entity, and Flourish facilitates transfers between the two programs, they are otherwise separate financially:

  • Funds in Flourish Cash are held on-deposit, in cash, at FDIC-member Program Banks. Clients who deposit funds with Flourish Cash have no exposure to Flourish Crypto or cryptocurrency more generally. Every single monthly statement lists exactly how client deposits are allocated across our Program Banks.
  • The performance of crypto has no impact on clients funds in Flourish Cash. All cryptocurrencies could drop to zero and it would not have a material impact on Flourish Cash or on the Flourish business overall.
  • There is no “leverage” in either Flourish Cash or Flourish Crypto. Flourish Cash simply deposits cash at FDIC-member banks; Flourish Crypto simply allows clients to buy, sell and hold actual cryptocurrencies.
  • More generally, the Flourish business is stronger than it ever has been in our history.  

Continuing support for advisors

At Flourish, our mission is to provide RIAs with innovative access to a full suite of financial products that advisors can’t easily access today, allowing advisors to help clients with all aspects of their financial lives.

Recent turbulence in the banking industry has driven home the importance to many advisors of having a solution for the cash that clients have sitting in checking and savings accounts. Flourish Cash has seen record activity as a result, with thousands of invites and hundreds of millions in deposits each month.

At the same time, the 2023 Bitwise survey of advisors showed that, despite volatility, client interest in crypto remains high.4 “There are a lot of people accessing crypto in unregulated, unsecured ways,” said Flourish President Ben Cruikshank. “Whether you love it or hate it, in a world where tens of millions of Americans are investing in crypto, we believe it’s critical for advisors to have access to solutions that are at least as good as the options available to retail consumers.” With crypto outperforming traditional asset classes in 2023,5 we expect interest to continue to grow and will continue to offer advisors access to solutions that enable them to meet the needs of today’s clients, and the needs of clients in the generation to come.

 

About Flourish

Flourish builds technology that empowers financial advisors, improves financial lives and retirement outcomes, and delivers new and innovative investment options to advisors. Today, the Flourish platform is used by more than 650 wealth management firms representing more than $1.5 trillion in assets under management. Flourish is wholly-owned by MassMutual. For more information, visit www.flourish.com.

 

Interested in learning more about Flourish Cash?

Flourish
Help Center
Login
Contact
Legal and Privacy

Flourish is an online platform through which investors can access financial services and products. The services and products offered through Flourish are provided by different entities and are subject to different terms, investor protections and risks. Flourish Cash is offered by Flourish Financial LLC, a registered broker-dealer and FINRA member. Flourish Financial LLC is not a bank. Check the background of Flourish Financial LLC and its personnel on FINRA's BrokerCheck. Flourish Crypto is offered by Paxos Trust Company, LLC, a New York limited purpose trust company regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services that provides cryptocurrency custody and execution services for the Flourish Crypto accounts, and Flourish Digital Assets LLC, which is registered in New York as a commodity broker-dealer and provides website and other technology services and support for Flourish Crypto accounts. Flourish Financial LLC and Flourish Digital Assets LLC are affiliates, but are not affiliates of Paxos. Please review the Legal section of our website, and the disclosures provided with each Flourish service or product, for further information regarding each service and product. If you were introduced or invited to Flourish by a third-party investment adviser or other third party, whose name or logo may be shown above, please be aware that, unless otherwise disclosed to you, they are not affiliated with any Flourish entity. The role of the investment adviser or other firm that invited you to Flourish may vary between different Flourish services and products, as further described in the terms for each service or product. © 2023 Flourish. All rights reserved.

1 Flourish Crypto is an investment account through which investors can trade cryptocurrencies and maintain custody of cryptocurrencies and U.S. dollars. Custody of Flourish Crypto accounts and cryptocurrency trading services are provided by Paxos Trust Company, LLC (Paxos) in accordance with the Paxos Terms. Paxos is a New York limited purpose trust company regulated by the New York Department of Financial Services. Website and other services and support for Flourish Crypto are provided by Flourish Digital Assets LLC (Flourish Digital Assets) in accordance with the Flourish Crypto Terms. Flourish Digital Assets is registered in New York as a commodity broker-dealer. Cryptocurrencies held in Flourish Crypto accounts are not currently eligible for in-kind transfer to other custodians or wallets. Investing in cryptocurrencies involves a high degree of risk, as further described in our risk disclosures. Flourish Crypto accounts are separate from Flourish Cash accounts and assets in Flourish Crypto accounts are not eligible for protection by the FDIC or SIPC.

2 A Flourish Cash account is a brokerage account offered by Flourish Financial LLC, a registered broker-dealer and FINRA member. Flourish Financial LLC is not a bank. Check the background of Flourish Financial LLC and its personnel on FINRA's BrokerCheck. The cash balance in a Flourish Cash account will be swept from the brokerage account to deposit account(s) at one or more third-party Program Banks that have agreed to accept deposits from customers of Flourish Financial LLC. The accounts at Program Banks will pay a variable rate of interest. 

3 The cash balance in a Flourish Cash account that is swept to one or more Program Banks is eligible for FDIC insurance, subject to FDIC rules, including aggregate insurance coverage limits. FDIC insurance will not be provided until funds arrive at the Program Bank. There are currently at least 12 Program Banks available to accept deposits for business Flourish Cash accounts and personal Flourish Cash accounts, and we are not obligated to allocate customer funds across more than this number of Program Banks if there is a greater number of banks in the program. Customers are generally eligible for FDIC insurance coverage of $250,000 per customer, per Program Bank, for each account ownership category. Thus, business customers are eligible for up to $3,000,000 of FDIC insurance and personal customers are eligible for (i) up to $3,000,000 of FDIC insurance for an individual account or revocable living trust account and (ii) up to $6,000,000 of FDIC insurance for a joint account with two owners or joint revocable living trust(s). The total FDIC coverage for a two-person household is calculated assuming that each household member has an individual account and that both household members share a joint account. If the number of Program Banks decreases for a customer (for instance, because a customer chooses to exclude Program Banks from receiving their deposits), the amount of FDIC insurance through Flourish Cash could be lower. Typically, all of a customer’s deposits at a Program Bank in the same ownership category (including deposits held outside Flourish Cash or held through multiple Flourish Cash accounts with the same ownership category) count toward the FDIC insurance limit for deposits at that Program Bank. Customers are responsible for monitoring whether they maintain deposits at a Program Bank outside of Flourish Cash and should consider choosing to exclude that Program Bank from receiving their deposits to avoid exceeding FDIC insurance limits. Although Flourish Cash is offered through a brokerage account and cash held in brokerage accounts often has the benefit of SIPC protection, until such time as we offer securities products, customers likely will not have the benefit of SIPC protection. SIPC protection is not available for cash held at the Program Banks. Our current Program Banks can be found here. For additional information regarding FDIC coverage, visit https://fdic.gov/.

4 The Bitwise/VettaFi 2023 Benchmark Survey of Financial Advisor Attitudes Toward Crypto Assets, January 2023. 

5 Akintade, Temitope. “Bitcoin outperforms other asset classes in Q1 2023.” Technext. April 4, 2023.