20. Cash and cash equivalents

Cash and cash equivalents may comprise cash at banks, bank deposits and money market funds that are readily convertible to cash and are subject to an insignificant risk of changes in value. Cash and cash equivalents on 31 December 2022 comprised €50.0 million of term deposits which all had an original maturity longer than 3 months but are readily convertible to cash without a significant penalty. All cash and cash equivalents are available upon maximum three month notice period and without significant penalty. Cash at banks were mainly composed of notice accounts and current accounts. Our credit risk is mitigated by selecting a panel of highly rated financial institutions for our deposits.

On 31 December 2022, our cash and cash equivalents included $97.3 million held in USD, which could generate a foreign currency exchange gain or loss in our financial results in accordance with the fluctuation of the EUR/USD exchange rate as our functional currency is EUR. We refer to note 9 for more details about the currency exchange gains or losses recognized in our consolidated income statement.