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Inaccurate Financing Statement
Sure, it happens. People make mistakes. But, when does a mistake made on a financing statement render it 'seriously misleading' under revised Uniform Commercial Code '9-506 and thus ineffective to perfect an asserted security interest? The Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida recently addressed this issue in the case of In re John's Bean Farm of Homestead Inc. No. 07-11868-BKC-LMI (Nov. 1, 2007).
Case History
The debtor, a Florida corporation that owned and operated a commercial bean farm, borrowed nearly $200,000 to purchase a piece of farm equipment. While the loan was surprisingly never memorialized in writing, after the debtor defaulted, the creditor purported to take a security interest in the equipment, evidenced by a Security Agreement and Secured Promissory Note. However, in an attempt to perfect this security interest, the creditor filed a UCC-1 Financing Statement with the Florida Secured Transaction Registry, which mistakenly identified the debtor as 'John Bean Farms, Inc.' instead of the debtor's actual name of incorporation, 'John's Bean Farm of Homestead, Inc.' In fact, as the court noted, all of the documents evidencing the transaction used the name 'John Bean Farms, Inc.' The debtor's financial troubles continued and a Chapter 7 bankruptcy was filed. The creditor filed a proof of claim asserting a total claim in the amount of $152,000, claiming $120,000 was secured and $32,000 was an unsecured priority claim.
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The Article 8 Opt In
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The Benefits of Blockchain for e-Discovery and Data Preservation
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