Bank of America making more local friends - The Spire spirals through court

First it was Block 37. Now it is the Spire. According to this Tribune story, Shelbourne Development and Garrett Kelleher are counter-suing the bank for fraud, saying that the bank was deceptive in the terms of arranging its portion of the financing for the now-dormant project. B of A went after Kelleher on a $4.9 million guarantee previously, and this is the response.

As with past cases, I haven't read the papers and am not planning to do so unless someone sends them to me and/or pays me. According to the story, the counterclaim says that Shelbourne should not be deemed in default because of the economy, in which B of A has taken billions of bailout money. That smacks of the Trump Tower force majeure defense and I think that will be a tough battle.

In addition, and again according to the story, one of the allegations of fraud is based on this: "the bank took the proceeds of a certificate of deposit owned by Shelbourne for more than $3.5 million and applied it to the amount due, an amount that was overstated because Bank of America “intentionally and deceptively” calculated the interest rate based on a 360-day year."

Huh?

Since when isn't interest on a commercial loan calculated based on a 360 day year? Maybe that overstates it, but it is not uncommon to see this provision at all in loan documents. Was it not here? Even if it was not supposed to be a 360 day year, I'm not sure that rises to the level of fraud, which is pretty hard to prove and win in Illinois. Maybe I am missing something since I haven't had a cup of coffee this morning....