AI-assisted research summary: A trust company may act as an agent, but it must keep a written memorandum of the agency terms and send annual and final account statements. It also must maintain specified reserve amounts, and the section does not apply to occasional or isolated special-request acts.
(a) A trust company may act as an agent in behalf of a principal in the transaction of any business or in the management of any property, real, personal or mixed, with such powers as the trust company may exercise under sections 412:8-200 and 412:8-201; provided, that its duties as such agent and the terms and conditions of the agency or power are set forth either specifically or generally in a written memorandum signed by the principal. (b) Every trust company undertaking or continuing to act as agent for any principal pursuant to this section shall mail or deliver to the principal or any authorized representative of the principal at stated intervals, not less frequently than once a year, and at the termination of the agency, a written statement of account setting forth: (1) All receipts and disbursements since the inception of the agency or the last previous account rendered under this paragraph, as the case may be, in such detail as will identify all properties purchased or sold during the period; (2) The credit or debit balance, as the case may be, as of the final date of the accounting period; and (3) A complete inventory of all properties, whether real, personal, or mixed, title to or custody or safekeeping of which is then held by the trust company for the account of the principal. The account shall contain such segregation of principal and income as the principal in writing specifically requires. (c) Unless previously barred by adjudication, consent or limitation, any claim against an agent for breach of fiduciary duty in connection with the agency relationship is barred as to any principal to whom the agent has mailed or delivered an annual or final accounting fully disclosing the matter in question unless a proceeding to assert the claim is commenced within two years after the annual or final accounting has been mailed or delivered to the principal. In any event and notwithstanding lack of full disclosure, an agent who has mailed or delivered an annual or final accounting to the principal and has informed the principal of the location and availability of records for the principal's examination is protected after three years from the date such accounting was mailed or delivered. (d) Every trust company shall have on hand at all times in actual money of the United States an amount equal to at least twelve per cent of all agency credit balances payable on demand and of accounts payable, plus at least five per cent of all agency credit balances payable on time; provided that such reserve may be deposited payable on demand in banks and other trust companies approved by the commissioner or may be cash in the vaults of the trust company. (e) The requirements of this section shall not apply to occasional or isolated acts performed under special instructions or at the special request of a principal who is not a general or regular client of the trust company. [L 1993, c 350, pt of §1]