Moses Singer is well known for its experience in trade finance. Our attorneys have the experience essential to negotiate, structure, and document highly complex and varied transactions. For examples of the wide range of trade finance services that our Banking & Finance Group provides, please read below.

Trade, Export, and International Development Finance & Supplier Finance

Moses Singer routinely represents its clients in transactions including import and export letters of credit and documentary collections, so-called “silent confirmations,” supply chain finance, payment claims processing, accounts receivable purchasing and forfaiting, discounting drafts, bill of exchange and promissory notes, payment guarantees, commodity finance, pre-export finance, post-import finance, trade loans, export credit agency (ECA) finance, and international development finance.

Our experience includes cross-border credit facilities for borrowers in dozens of countries in Africa, Asia (including the Middle East), Europe, North America, and South America. Structured transactions in which we have advised our clients include transactions supported by direct loans made and guarantees and insurance policies issued by agencies, development finance institutions, and multilateral investment banks, including Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank), Export Development Canada (EDC), Coface (France), SACE (Italy), Hermes (Germany), EKF (Denmark), ERG (Switzerland), ECGD (U.K.), Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), and SEK (Sweden). 

Transactions advised by Moses Singer’s attorneys are often at the cutting edge of global finance. For example, Moses Singer has advised commercial banks in connection with newly adopted International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) rules after one of our attorneys was involved in drafting the new rules (e.g., ISP98 and URBPO). Moses Singer’s attorneys have also represented global commercial banks in connection with the first-ever Ex-Im Bank guaranteed loan to a foreign financing company to provide funding for the purchase by one of its affiliates of automobile parts manufactured in and exported from the United States and a privatization-driven restructuring of a credit facility to a South American power company in which an OPIC non-honoring of sovereign guaranty insurance policy was converted into a direct guaranty of the obligations of the borrower, which was also the first-ever transaction of its kind.

Letters of Credit & Credit Support

Several major banks, other financial institutions, and companies regularly look to Moses Singer in complex matters involving letters of credit, including transactions, litigation and DOCDEX proceedings. The firm's clients include issuers of commercial (documentary), direct-pay, and standby letters of credit, and standby bond purchase agreements, as well as commitments to honor or negotiate documents, bank guarantees and committed lines of credit, both to provide credit for commercial transactions and to provide credit support and liquidity for a variety of obligations, including commercial paper, industrial development bonds (IDBs), industrial revenue bonds (IRBs), and other tax exempt variable rate demand obligations, insurance obligations, asset securitizations, judgments, and other structured financings. Two of our Banking attorneys are at the forefront of this area of banking law. One was a leader in the 1990s revision of the Uniform Commercial Code's letter of credit provisions (UCC Article 5), the drafting of the 1998 International Standby Practices (ISP98, rules for standby letters of credit), the preparation of the 2022 UCC Article 5 amendments that have been sent to the states for enactment (as well as participating in the drafting of new UCC Article 12 on Controllable Electronic Records (CER)), and also advised as to the drafting or revising of other International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) practice rules, including the Uniform Rules for Bank Payment Obligations. Both have chaired or co-chaired the American Bar Association’s Letters of Credit Subcommittee, and both were heavily involved in successfully proposing revisions to the letter of credit subfacility provisions of model syndicated revolving credit agreement forms promulgated by the Loan Syndication and Trading Association (LSTA).

We regularly work with ICC rules such as UCP600, eUCP, ISP98, URR 725, URDG 758, and URC 522. The credit facilities we handle range from bilateral to syndicated, from plain vanilla to synthetic and alternative (ALOC) structures. We have also worked on outsourcing and white-label and private-label transactions in the letter of credit arena.

Industry Leaders

Moses Singer’s attorneys routinely write and present on trade, export, and international development finance topics at various industry and legal association gatherings and privately for the firm’s clients and have had major roles in projects to revise or draft laws, rules, regulations and forms in this area.

International Transactions

In addition to transactions centered in the United States of America, we regularly represent lenders, borrowers, trustees, agents, issuing banks, confirming banks and other nominated banks, beneficiaries, participants, secured parties, purchasers of negotiable drafts, bills of exchange, and promissory notes, depositary banks, securities intermediaries, and other parties in a wide range of cross-border transactions. We frequently address the complex requirements for multi-jurisdictional collateralization and credit support and coordinate the obtaining of legal opinions from multiple jurisdictions.

Notable Moses Singer Wins in Letter of Credit & Documentary Collections Cases

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