Legal infrastructure beyond compliance theater
Alternative asset lending operates within overlapping regulatory frameworks: federal guidance on digital assets, state-by-state UCC adoption, banking supervision requirements for model risk, and True Lender considerations for partnership structures. We built infrastructure that satisfies all of them.
The legal infrastructure for digital collateral
UCC Article 12, now enacted in 33 jurisdictions, creates a new category of property called Controllable Electronic Records. This includes cryptocurrency, tokenized securities, electronic payment rights, and other native digital assets. Article 12 fundamentally changes how security interests work: control-based perfection has priority over perfection through filing, regardless of timing.
Super-priority through control
A secured party who obtains "control" of a CER has priority over a secured party who only filed a financing statement, even if the filing was earlier. This inverts the traditional first-to-file rule under Article 9. Technical infrastructure that establishes control creates structural advantages.
Control requirements
Control requires: (1) power to enjoy substantially all benefits of the record, (2) exclusive power to prevent others from enjoying benefits, and (3) exclusive power to transfer control. This is technical architecture.
Choice of law
Section 12-107 permits CERs to specify their governing jurisdiction. Transactions can be structured under adopting-state law regardless of borrower location. D.C. law applies as default if no jurisdiction is specified.
33 jurisdictions enacted
Article 12 adoption accelerated through 2025. New York signed in December 2025 (effective June 2026), joining California, Florida, Delaware, Texas, Illinois, and 27 other jurisdictions. The transition period through 2027 creates a window for early movers.
Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Washington
Six states with explicit statutory tests
Six states have enacted specific legislation defining when a financial institution is the "true lender" in a partnership arrangement. Our architecture satisfies each jurisdiction's requirements through structural separation of lending authority from technology services.
CFL licensing for loan brokers with economic interest tests
UCCC provisions requiring lender-of-record documentation
Predatory Lending Database requirements and licensing
CLA licensing with true lender determination factors
Consumer Loan Act requirements for lending authority
WVCCPA provisions on credit service organizations
Your institution remains the lender
Our partnership structure ensures unambiguous True Lender positioning. The financial institution makes all credit decisions, funds loans at origination, owns all loans, and retains all economic risk. Aaim provides technology services: valuation, perfection automation, and compliance documentation. When examiners ask who the lender is, the documentation structure provides the answer.
Credit decisions
Your institution applies its own underwriting criteria. Aaim provides asset valuations; you decide whether to lend.
Loan funding
Your institution funds loans at origination from its own capital. No warehouse lines. No pass-through arrangements.
Loan ownership
Your institution owns all loans on its balance sheet. No assignments. No participation interests sold to Aaim.
Economic risk
Your institution retains all credit risk and all lending economics. Aaim earns technology service fees, not loan economics.
OCC Bulletin 2011-12 compliance
The OCC requires that banks and federal savings associations manage model risk effectively. Our valuation models are documented, validated, and monitored according to the bulletin's supervisory guidance. NCUA Letter 18-CU-03 provides analogous guidance for credit unions.
Documentation generated at origination
Every loan generates a complete examination package. Documentation is not assembled after the fact; it is created during origination and updated throughout the loan lifecycle.
Seven-year immutable records
Every valuation, every decision, every signature is recorded to an immutable ledger. When examiners ask questions, you have answers, not reconstructions.
Complete audit trails for every loan, every valuation, every decision
ECOA compliance built in
Fair lending compliance is not an afterthought. ECOA analysis tools, adverse action notice generation, and disparate impact monitoring are integrated into the platform.
ECOA analysis
Automated analysis of lending patterns across protected classes. Identify potential issues before they become problems.
Adverse action notices
Compliant adverse action notice generation with specific reasons for denial based on actual underwriting criteria applied.
Disparate impact monitoring
Ongoing monitoring for disparate impact with alerting when patterns deviate from expected distributions.