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Alaska Fur Gallery, Inc. v. First Nat'l Bank Alaska

Ch. 11. First National Bank Alaska ("FNBA") filed two secured claims based on deeds of trust secured by debtor’s Juneau real property. FNBA argued that the two loans were also secured by debtor’s business personal property. The debtor disagreed and filed an adversary complaint to determine the extent of FNBA’s liens. The court found that a dragnet clause in an earlier commercial loan, secured by the debtor’s business personal property, operated to secure the subsequent real property loans made by same lender, even after the business personal property loan had been paid in full. The court discussed the Alaska Supreme Court’s Lundgren v. National Bank of Alaska decision and looked at cases from other jurisdictions. It also looked to AS 45.29.204(c), and found Comment 5 to the UCC controlling. These were commercial transactions; the parties were held to a higher degree of sophistication than in consumer transactions. The dragnet clause was not ambiguous, nor was it buried in the fine print. The clause was enforceable; FNBA’s claims were secured by both the real property and the debtor’s business personal property.

File: 
Date: 
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
ABR Number: 
11 ABR 29
Code Section: 
157(b)(2)(B)
Keyword: 
Commercial Transaction
Cross-collateralization
Dragnet Clause
Future Advances
UCC
Case No.: 
A09-00196-DMD