Luigi Bruno
Published: 2016
Total Pages:
Get eBook
"Countries worldwide are becoming increasingly aware of the existing relationship between the economy and the regulatory environment. The pressure exercised by International Organizations, Financial Institutions and Multinational Corporations is spurring this awareness continuously. Lawmakers across the globe are moulding key areas of their legal systems to get an alleged competitive boost on the international economic markets. One of these key areas is secured transactions. According to the studies conducted by prominent economists, by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) and by the World Bank (WB), access to credit is considered an important development factor both at macroeconomic and microeconomic levels - that is for nations, companies and individuals. Secured transactions laws, therefore, by regulating access to credit are the subjects of these studies, which aim by using econometric methodologies, at evaluating the economic efficiency of that regulatory framework. On this basis countries are adopting reform suggestions created with the specific intent of easing the getting credit process and, as a consequence, prompt economic development. The wide adoption of these reform suggestions is producing as a result not only a cross-country circulation of legal patterns, but it is also inducing lawmakers to loosen the collateral requirements necessary to the getting credit process. Examples of this process are the reforms enacted in Quebec, France and Belgium and the deep discussion currently held in Italy regarding the results that a substantial reform of the field would produce for the economy. Common denominator of these reforms in the adoption of a unitary non-possessory security interest developed on the model of the Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code. In this light, two questions arise: if we consider the concept of cultural specificity of the law, how can reform laws designed upon econometric measurements and foreign models be able to perform their function in different legal systems? And then, if loosened collateral requirements are the common denominator of all these reforms, what are the potential negative implications on individual consumers?" --