Fixed Charges on Book Debts—The Story Continues

Extract

For the purposes of creating consensual security interests, are a debt and its proceeds a single indivisible asset or can they be separated? Is a security on book debts and proceeds a single indivisible charge or two charges? If it is a single indivisible charge, can it be a convertible charge, that is a charge which is fixed so long as it attaches to unrealised debts but floating in respect of proceeds of the debts? Recent decisions of the English courts have shrouded these questions in confusion. The appeal from the New Zealand Court of Appeal’s decision in Re Brumark Investments Ltd. [2000] 1 B.C.L.C. 353 gives the Privy Council an opportunity to provide much-needed clarification.