“Acting reasonably” and other legal jargon
On this week’s episode of A Dictionary of Finance podcast, Allar and Matt challenge four lawyers to explain legal terms used in banking as if they were participating in a game show.
Snooze, you lose — If a bank does not react in time, it loses the right to vote on a request from a borrower. Often used in syndicated loans with a high number of participants.
Pari passu — being on equal terms with other participants, having equal rights and obligations as other lenders, for example.
Imagine you’re throwing a wonderful summer party in the garden for a bunch of friends. You send them invitations asking them to RSVP. You set up the music, the food and the drinks. … Now imagine that this story about the dinner party RSVPs will help you understand a legal clause in a syndicated loan agreement. Pretty incredible, right? But it’s true.
In this week’s episode, we went on a quest to find the most incredible sounding legal terms that lawyers use at the European Investment Bank. We then challenged these lawyers to explain the terms in a way that wouldn’t make someone snooze at a garden party.
For example, we will help you understand what the Latin phrases “mutatis mutandis”, “ipsa loquitur”, “pari passu” and “in rem security” mean. Really, we will. And there is more than just Latin: You’ll also learn about “snooze, you lose” and the definition of the innocent-sounding “reservation of rights” which, it turns out, can be quite frightening.
If you think all this legal jargon is unnecessary, and that people should just act reasonably, beware: We found out that “acting reasonably” is, in fact, a complicated legal term! So, don’t say it, unless you’ve listened to this episode, and you actually mean what you say.
Competing to provide the most exciting legal terms (and their explanations) were:
- Kinga Soltész, counsel in the European Investment Bank’s Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Eastern Neighbours division.
- Matthias Brzezinski, counsel in the Austria and Germany legal unit of the EIB.
- Maria José Cerrato Sánchez, senior counsel for the EIB’s Spain and Portugal legal division.
- and Tom Nguyen, counsel in the UK and Ireland unit of the European Investment Bank’s legal directorate.
Last but not least, a shout-out to our seven listeners in Mongolia! Our latest web statistics show we have listeners all over the world, and we’re excited about each one. Let us know who you are, what we can do better, and what terms and topics we should cover in future episodes by tweeting to @EIBMatt and/or @AllarTankler. You can (and should!) subscribe to A Dictionary of Finance podcast in the iTunes podcast app, on Stitcher or any other podcast platform.
Originally published at www.eib.org.
