• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.76
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• pp.103-123
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• 2017

If additional condition in letter of credit is used in malicious way, it affects the international trade transaction in jeopardy. Therefore, it's significant to identify whether additional conditions are malicious or ordinary in the transaction with letter of credit. In normal cases, thanks to lots of useful features as an international payment method, such as security of payment, legal protection, and versatility, a letter of credit is widely used in international trade. However, even with these advantageous features, a letter of credit is complicate and costly to use, compared to other payment methods. Furthermore, due to its principle of independence from underlying contract, a use of letter of credit creates another type of concern for proper handling and needs significant caution upon field use. At some points, malicious additional conditions are used for buyer's advantage in deal making and fraud instance in worst situation. In addition, some countries request malicious conditions against sellers as a non-tariff barrier. Therefore it's extremely important to recognize whether malicious additional condition exists in letter of credit and, if so, how to deal with it. This study delivers the information to distinguish and categorize the malicious conditions in various cases and to figure out how to deal with them for safer trade with less risk.