Amendment agreement

For a sober article about the law relating to contractual variation, see amendment.

What is it about amendment agreements that throws our legal colleagues into such a metaphysical loop? We have an agreement, and we have decided to amend it. All agree it is for the best that we write this down.

Let the lexical contortions commence:

Dear old ISDA

From our colleagues in the “Thanks for writing in, ISDA” department.

Compare:

A valiant try...

with:

GUESS WHICH ONE IS FROM PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE AND WHICH ONE WAS IN A STANDARD ISDA AMENDMENT AGREEMENT.

Makes you glad to be alive, doesn’t it?Let’s now say we need to amend and restate this amendment. What to do? Can we help ourselves go to town here? No, dear readers, we cannot.

That's better.

Other examples

From the THIS IS NOT A DRILL department, another example of a real life amendment agreement (this one from a CDEA, not that that really makes any difference).

The author shall remain nameless.

To the best of this mediocre lawyer’s comprehension, that concoction boils down to this:

“The parties wish to amend their Agreement on the terms set out in the schedule. The agreement will otherwise continue in full force and effect.”

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