NOTE: Payments, Sales and Secured Financing Transactions cover different components of the Commercial Code. Students may take all three of these courses or just one. Students may not take Sales or Secured Financing Transactions in addition to the Commercial Code course.
An introduction to the “payments” articles of the Uniform Commercial Code, namely Article 3 (Negotiable Instruments), Article 4 (Banking), Article 4A (Electronic Funds Transfers), and Article 5 (Letters of Credit). Related topics include non-UCC payment systems such as credit cards, with a minimum amount of federal regulation as necessary.
The core of the course (and the reason to study payments even if you never wish to become a bank lawyer) is the doctrine of negotiability and the rights of the bona fide purchaser, known in this context as the “holder in due course.” Negotiability--or the interesting idea that the transferee can get more than the transferor had to give--runs through the whole of commercial law and the UCC, but it is particularly prominent in the payments context.
