The Letter Of Credit Primary Source Edition PDF Download

This thesis puts forward two principal arguments. First, it argues that commercial letters of credit and standby letters of credit should not be treated on an equal footing. They are, and should be, treated as two separate undertakings with respect to the application of the fraud exception. Secondly, the thesis argues that there should be a 'wider' fraud exception for standby letters of credit; however, the need is to explore how wide that fraud exception should be. To support the arguments of this thesis, the study examines the application of the fraud exception in four major jurisdictions: the US, England, Canada and Australia. Out of these four jurisdictions, two - the US and Canada - have been expressly applying the wider fraud test to standby letters of credit and the other two have traditionally applied the more stringent fraud test to standby credits. The research will compare and critically examine these four jurisdictions' approaches to their different tests of the fraud rule to standby letters of credit, and argue that the fraud rule for standby letters of credit should neither be too narrow ('fraud in documents') nor should it be too wide (fraud in the inducement or unconscionable conduct or bad faith). It is argued that standby letters of credit are more abstract than commercial letters of credit; therefore, protecting the principle of the autonomy of these independent undertakings is of paramount importance. The study argues that even the wider fraud exception (the 'fraud in the transaction' defence) should be given a narrow meaning: in order to protect the independence of standby credits, it should be confined to cases in which the beneficiary had 'no bona fide belief in the validity of its claim. The thesis clearly shows that the wider 'fraud as no bona fide claim' is an appropriate fraud defence for standby letters of credit whereas for commercial letters of credit the fraud exception should be narrowly confined to 'fraud in documents', which is arguably an appropriate test for these undertakings.