Certain funds
What does certain funds mean in acquisition finance?
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BY MICHAEL SHANG · SIXTEEN YEARS IN COMMERCIAL BANKING · UPDATED
// THE SHORT ANSWER
Certain funds is an acquisition finance commitment under which the lenders can refuse to advance during an agreed period only for a short list of serious events, such as non-payment, insolvency, breach of a major representation or illegality, and not for a general deterioration or a material adverse change. It lets a buyer show a seller or a takeover regulator that the money will be there. In UK public takeovers the Takeover Code requires a third party to confirm that a cash bidder has the funds, and Australian and New Zealand takeover rules also expect a bidder to show it can pay.
BASIS Practitioner judgment from sixteen years in commercial banking, set out in How Bankers Think (Highbank Press, 2026). Every borrower on this site is a composite constructed for teaching, not a client. The market is mid-market commercial lending as practised in New Zealand and Australia; where a convention differs elsewhere, the page says so.
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