Cal. Codes » Commercial Code / DIVISION 3. NEGOTIABLE INSTRUMENTS / CHAPTER 1. General Provisions and Definitions
California Codes

Cal. Commercial Code § 3109 (2026)

General Provisions and Definitions — Negotiable Instruments

✓ current as of May 2026
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(a)A promise or order is payable to bearer if it is any of the following:

(1)States that it is payable to bearer or to the order of bearer or otherwise indicates that the person in possession of the promise or order is entitled to payment.

(2)Does not state a payee.

(3)States that it is payable to or to the order of cash or otherwise indicates that it is not payable to an identified person.

(b)A promise or order that is not payable to bearer is payable to order if it is payable (1) to the order of an identified person or (2) to an identified person or order. A promise or order that is payable to order is payable to the identified person.

(c)An instrument payable to bearer may become payable to an identified person if it is specially indorsed pursuant to subdivision (a) of Section 3205. An instrument payable to an identified person may become payable to bearer if it is indorsed in blank pursuant to subdivision (b) of Section 3205.

Notes of Decisions
Cited in 3 cases (1 in the last 5 years), 2014–2023 · leading case: In re: Cecchi Gori Pictures Cecchi Gori USA, Inc. (9th Cir. BAP 2019).
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In re: Cecchi Gori Pictures Cecchi Gori USA, Inc. (9th Cir. BAP 2019). “Accordingly, the only value given by Mr. Israilovici in exchange for the Assets was $1.”
Rainsdon v. Grant (Bankr. D. Idaho 2023). “” Cal. Com. Code § 3109 . Here, the Note is payable to “Lender,” defined in the document as “Shannon Fasano,” and therefore meets the first requirement.”
Mel-Jen, Inc. v. Bank of Am. CA2/7 (Cal. Ct. App. 2014). “Hutton, the checks were made payable to a third party who was not physically present for the transaction, whereas here, the checks were made payable to “CASH.”
Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.