# Legal status and digital transactions

Original teaching companion to Albert Tan Sin Hon, *Insurance-Backed Offshore Liquidity* (University of Groningen Press, 2026).

Chapter 7, printed pp. 227–252; 7.1–7.5 and 7.9–7.12. [Open the published PDF](https://books.ugp.rug.nl/ugp/catalog/download/300/584/1875#page=229).

Legal cut-off: 1 August 2026. This lesson explains the edition; it does not verify subsequent law.

## Learning goals

- Separate enactment, commencement, guidance and operational availability.
- Distinguish technical signing ability from legal authority.
- Identify the obligations and risks introduced by a digital intermediary.

## Reading guide

Future-facing advice begins with the status and date of each source. A Bill, enacted text awaiting commencement and a rule in force support different propositions. A licence does not prove that a particular product has launched or that a particular customer can use it. Digital form introduces questions about issuer obligations, custody, credentials, payment discharge and failure. The chapter applies these distinctions to proposed transactions without rewriting an earlier completed legal history. Its discussion is fixed to the edition’s legal cut-off and requires fresh primary-source checking for present advice.

## 90-minute seminar

- **10 minutes:** Recall the assigned reading and define the decision to be made.
- **20 minutes:** Discuss the reading guide and test its distinctions against the text.
- **25 minutes:** Work in pairs on the constructed exercise, recording missing evidence.
- **20 minutes:** Compare reasons with the facilitator commentary and challenge an inference.
- **10 minutes:** Debate the challenge question using a specified rule or evidence gap.
- **5 minutes:** Complete the exit task and identify a source to revisit.

## Constructed exercise

A fictional proposal would pay a supplier using a digital unit. The file contains a press release, an enacted but uncommenced provision, a custodian’s terms and evidence that an employee controls the signing key. The supplier’s acceptance terms are missing. Prepare a status table and identify the questions that prevent a conclusion that payment would discharge the invoice.

## Facilitator commentary

Record each source’s issuer, date, legal status and proposition. The press release may describe an intention; the uncommenced provision does not establish a present duty solely by enactment. Examine the unit’s claim, issuer, custody arrangement, corporate mandate and supplier agreement. Key possession proves practical signing capability, subject to the evidence, rather than authority or discharge. Any conclusion on current regulation needs current primary sources. The exercise gives no rule authorising the proposed payment.

## Challenge for discussion

What evidence should reopen a previous opinion when a scheme launches or a provision commences?

## Exit task

List three separate propositions hidden in the phrase “the transaction is approved”.

Teaching material: CC BY 4.0. The published book retains CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. AI-assisted material commissioned by the author, separately prepared and not publisher-reviewed.