First Nat. Bank of Chicago v. Standard Bank & Trust

• Decision Date: 26 March 1999
• Docket Number: 98-2575,Nos. 98-2533,s. 98-2533
• Citation: 172 F.3d 472
• Parties: 38 UCC Rep.Serv.2d 1 FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF CHICAGO, f/k/a NBD Bank, Plaintiff-Appellant, Cross-Appellee, v. STANDARD BANK & TRUST, Defendant-Appellee, Cross-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 472

172 F.3d 472

38 UCC Rep.Serv.2d 1

FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF CHICAGO, f/k/a NBD Bank, Plaintiff-Appellant, Cross-Appellee, v. STANDARD BANK & TRUST, Defendant-Appellee, Cross-Appellant.

Nos. 98-2533, 98-2575.

United States Court of Appeals,

Seventh Circuit.

Argued Feb. 12, 1999.

Decided March 26, 1999.

Robert P. Hurlbert (argued), Dickinson, Wright, Moon, Van Dusen & Freeman, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Richard M. Franklin (argued), Baker & McKenzie, Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellee.

Before FLAUM, EASTERBROOK and MANION, Circuit Judges.

FLAUM, Circuit Judge.

First National Bank of Chicago, known at the time relevant to this suit as NBD Bank ("NBD"), brought an action for declaratory judgment alleging that Standard Bank & Trust ("Standard Bank" or "Standard") failed to return certain checks to NBD in a timely fashion under the Expedited Funds Availability Act, 12 U.S.C. § 4010(d) & (f) ("EFAA"). Finding that the checks were returned in a timely fashion, the district court granted summary judgment to the defendant Standard Bank, and awarded it prejudgment interest on the returned checks. Standard claimed it was entitled to the average prime rate for the relevant time period. However, the district court used the three-month Treasury Bill rate--4.9241%--compounded quarterly. Both sides appeal. For the reasons set out below, we affirm the district court's decision that the checks were properly returned, but vacate the award of interest, and remand for entry of the proper measure of prejudgment interest.

Background

This litigation revolves around which party--Standard or NBD--should absorb the losses resulting from a check-kiting scheme perpetrated against both of these banks in November, 1993. ¹ On November 18, 1993, an individual presented to NBD checks with an aggregate value of $3,997,406.75, drawn on customer accounts maintained at Standard Bank, which NBD initially accepted. That day, the same person deposited $4,025,000.00 in checks at Standard, drawn on NBD customer accounts.

The following day, Friday, November 19, 1993, NBD presented the checks it received to Standard, and vice versa. LaSalle Bank, in its capacity as the collecting bank, charged both banks' accounts for the checks drawn on them, and provisionally credited each bank for the amount presented to them. On the next business day (Monday, November 22, 1993), NBD opted not to honor the checks, and returned all of the checks, totaling $4,025,000.00, to Standard Bank. Standard received notice of NBD's decision on Tuesday morning, November 23. That afternoon, Standard attempted to dishonor the checks it had received. Three of its bank officers dashed off to NBD's Operations Processing Center carrying checks totaling $3,785,441.35. ² The checks were received by NBD at 3:58 p.m. that day, but NBD did not credit Standard's account for that sum.

On November 30, 1993, NBD filed suit, seeking a declaration that Standard Bank's return of the checks was not timely, because it neither met the "midnight deadline," nor any of the deadline's exceptions laid out in Federal Reserve Board ("the Board") Regulations appurtenant to EFAA. Standard Bank defended by arguing that its return was proper, and it counterclaimed for prejudgment interest.

On a motion for judgment on the pleadings, the district court originally found for NBD, but reversed its decision in light of a clarifying amendment ³ to the relevant Federal Reserve Regulations. The district court also decided that prejudgment interest was appropriate, but did not award the prime rate. Instead it chose a lower rate (the average T-bill rate) because of the absence of bad faith on NBD's part, and because this was a "close case." Each side appealed portions of the decision below.

I.

NBD's appeal from the district court's order granting Standard Bank's motion for judgment on the pleadings is reviewed by this court de novo. Rooding v. Peters, 92 F.3d 578, 579-80 (7th Cir.1996).

A.

The legal question at issue is whether Standard Bank's return of the checks comports with Federal Reserve Board Regulation CC § 229.30(c)(1), 12 C.F.R. Part 229 ("Regulation CC"). Regulation CC's language states:

(c) Extension of deadline. The deadline for return or notice of nonpayment under the U.C.C. or Regulation § 229.36(f)(2) of this part is extended:

(1) If a paying bank, in an effort to expedite delivery of a returned check to a bank, uses a means of delivery that would ordinarily result in the returned check being received by the bank to which it is sent on or before the receiving bank's next business day following the otherwise applicable deadline; this deadline is extended further if a paying bank uses a highly expeditious means of transportation, even if this means of transportation would ordinarily result in delivery after the receiving bank's next banking day.

As the text notes, Regulation CC extends the UCC's deadline, known in the vernacular as the "midnight deadline." ⁴ Under the UCC, a paying bank may dishonor or revoke its provisional settlement of a check before midnight on the next business day after it received the check. UCC § 4-301(a)(1); Hanna v. First Nat'l Bank of Rochester, 87 N.Y.2d 107, 637 N.Y.S.2d 953, 661 N.E.2d 683, 686 n. 2 (1995). While the Board favored the UCC's emphasis on expeditiously dealing with dishonored checks, it was concerned that the midnight deadline might unintentionally retard the return of checks. It noted "[b]ecause the return process must begin by midnight, many paying banks return checks by mail when a courier leaving after midnight would be faster." 52 Fed.Reg. 47119, 47123 (Dec. 11, 1987). Thus, the Board enacted the extension to the midnight deadline. ⁵

NBD argues that the Board's extension of the midnight deadline does not apply here. It primarily points to a number of statements in Regulation CC's legislative history indicating that use of the extension is limited to banks which regularly use couriers services to return checks. However, NBD is putting the cart before the horse--before we delve into the Board's commentary on Regulation CC, we must first examine its language's plain meaning.

Administrative rules are subject to the same well-known maxims of construction as legislative statutes. Alabama Tissue Ctr. v. Sullivan, 975 F.2d 373, 379 (7th Cir.1992). As we recently noted, in statutory construction cases, "the beginning point must be the language of the statute, and when a statute speaks with clarity to an issue, judicial inquiry into the statute's meaning, in all but the most extraordinary circumstances, is finished." United States v. Kirschenbaum, 156 F.3d 784, 789 (7th Cir.1998), (quoting Estate of Cowart v. Nicklos Drilling Co., 505 U.S. 469, 475, 112 S.Ct. 2589, 120 L.Ed.2d 379 (1992)). If we can decipher Regulation CC's meaning on its face, there is no need to examine legislative history absent extraordinary circumstances. United States v. Hudspeth, 42 F.3d 1015, 1022 (7th Cir.1994).

There is little in the text of the statute that supports NBD's argument that the extension is only available to banks which regularly or ordinarily use expedited delivery. Regulation CC extends the deadline when a paying bank "expedite[s] delivery of a returned check ..." and we note the singular "a returned check" rather than the plural "returned checks." See Metropolitan Stevedore Co. v. Rambo, 515 U.S. 291, 295, 115 S.Ct. 2144, 132 L.Ed.2d 226 (1995). Although it is not dispositive, this use of the singular suggests that Regulation CC may apply to one-time single check transactions. Far more conclusive is the structure of the second clause, which allows a bank to extend the deadline when it "uses a means of delivery that would ordinarily result in the returned check being received by the bank to which it is sent on or before the receiving bank's next business day following the otherwise applicable deadline." NBD argues, implausibly, that this mandates that a bank ordinarily or routinely use a means of expedited delivery in order to avail itself of the extension. For "ordinarily" to have such meaning, however, it would have to modify the verb "uses," causing the sentence to read: "a bank may extend the deadline if it ordinarily uses a means of delivery that would result in the returned check being received...." Of course, in the actual regulation, "ordinarily" modifies the verb "would result," denoting that the bank's means of delivery must ordinarily result in return by the applicable deadline. Any other reading, including the one NBD proposes, is contrary to the clear import of the second clause.

NBD also points to Regulation CC's first clause, which allows banks to use the extension "in an effort to expedite delivery of a returned check to a bank." It argues that Standard Bank's efforts were not in "an effort to expedite delivery" of the dishonored checks. We disagree. There is no doubt that Standard Bank's executives drove the checks to NBD's processing center in order to speed up delivery.

This interpretation squares with a leading commentary on the UCC by Professors White and Summers. Analyzing the plain language of Regulation CC (before the clarifying amendment) White and Summers posed--and answered--the following hypothetical:

Assume that the payor bank received a $100,000 check on Monday morning and that it discovers on Wednesday morning that it failed to send the check back by Tuesday midnight (the midnight deadline), but it now wishes to dishonor the check. Under the UCC the midnight deadline would have passed, and unless it had an unusual defense, payor would be liable for the $100,000. Regulation CC changes that. If the bank can somehow get the check back to the depositary bank before that bank's close of business on Wednesday, it escapes liability under the UCC. That appears to be the meaning of the first sentence of [Regulation CC § 229.30(c) ].

James J. White & Robert F. Summers, Uniform Commercial Code, at 325 (4th ed.1995)...