This Article proposes that complex structured finance transactions involving sophisticated investors should adopt an analogous solution to the home construction agreements’ strategy of contracting by reference to blueprints. First, dealmakers should, preferably by choice, place as much of their waterfall distribution specification and related inputs as possible into automated, programmatic representations that will be used to make the actual distribution. In many cases, these agreements already have programmatic representations, so this change should pose relatively few practical challenges logistically. Second, they should, like their counterparts in construction contracts, define the terms of those waterfalls by reference to their functional representations. The contract should be depicted by the same code that will decide the actual distribution, and that coded depiction should be the legally binding contract. By unifying the functional and legal realities of the structured finance products, dealmakers will avoid wasting resources on creating unnecessary and inaccurate legal depictions, and will also reduce the legal and financial risk created by the imprecision and inaccuracy of perception those poor depictions create.
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