Here are the top reads from the week. Have a great long weekend,
Private equity: Catalyst Capital Group Inc. CEO Newton Glassman is moving to reassure backers that deals are in the works to cash in on a number of major investments, in the face of growing pressure to show that long-promised profits will actually be paid to investors. Story (Jeffrey Jones, Andrew Willis, for subscribers)
Annual meetings: The chief executive of Toronto-Dominion Bank is vowing to continue financing energy projects – even as he stresses the bank’s commitment to helping Canada shift to a low-carbon economy. Story (James Bradshaw and Shawn McCarthy, for subscribers)
ROB Magazine: It’s time to start paying whistle-blowers for tips Opinion (Rita Trichur, for subscribers)
Pay gaps: A dearth of women in higher-paying jobs is driving a wide gender pay gap inside the British offices of two of Canada’s largest banks. Story (James Bradshaw)
Ontario Budget: Ontario government is making changes to the rules governing capital markets, giving the Ontario Securities Commission new tools to confront white-collar crime, stop repeat offenders and improve data sharing with other financial regulators. Story (Grant Robertson and Tom Cardoso)
Robo-adviser: Online portfolio manager Nest Wealth is widening its product shelf to become one of the first robo-advisers to offer group retirement savings plans for small to medium businesses in Canada. Story (Clare O’Hara)
Regulators: Canada’s securities regulators are taking steps to try to reduce the regulatory burden on publicly traded companies. Story (Alexandra Posadzki, for subscribers)
Disclosure: Aphria Inc.’s purchase of Nuuvera Inc. is raising legal questions that reverberate beyond the marijuana deal itself. Six Aphria directors and the cannabis grower’s chief financial officer did not disclose to the market that they personally held a total of 900,000 Nuuvera shares when the two companies struck an $826-million cash-and-stock deal in late January. By the time it closed last Friday, the transaction’s value had been cut in half. Under Ontario corporate law, the Aphria directors were not required to disclose their Nuuvera shares to the market – or recuse themselves from voting on the deal – unless Aphria deemed their holdings to be material. Story (Christina Pellegrini, for subscribers)
Disclosure: Four executives and three other directors of Aphria Inc. personally owned shares in Nuuvera Inc. at the time they orchestrated a takeover deal for the cannabis firm, but didn’t disclose their holdings to investors and later voted to approve the transaction at a board meeting. Story (Christina Pellegrini, for subscribers)
Poison pills: Canada’s largest-ever cannabis deal is all but done, but the battle that led up to its eventual negotiated conclusion will have long-lasting impacts on hostile takeover bids in all industries. Story (Jeffrey Jones, for subscribers)
Catalyst Capital: Shares of Canadian lender Callidus Capital Corp lost as much as 21.6 per cent in two trading sessions, hitting an all-time low, after a Reuters report on Friday raised questions about the valuations that parent company Catalyst Capital Group Inc assigned to some of its portfolio companies. Story
Catalyst Capital: It was already shaping up to be a busy week for Newton Glassman. Now, he has more explaining to do. Story (Jeff Jones, for subscribers)
IPOs: One of the United States’ oldest tech firms, Ceridian HCM Holding Inc., has filed to raise up to US$200-million in a dual U.S.-Canadian-listed IPO as it continues its rapid transformation into a hot cloud-software company under the leadership of Toronto-based entrepreneur David Ossip. Story (Sean Silcoff, for subscribers)
Fintech: Vancouver’s BuildDirect.com Technologies Inc. has emerged from creditor protection with a clean balance sheet and US$28-million in fresh financing to take a second crack at building the Amazon.com of the home-improvement market. Story (Sean Silcoff, for subscribers)
WRAP OF RECENT FINANCIAL SERVICES NEWS
Fines: Barclays will pay US$2 billion to settle claims for billions of dollars of losses suffered by investors who bought toxic mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the 2007 financial crisis, the U.S. Justice Department said on Thursday. Story
WRAP OF RECENT DEALS
Exchanges: The New York Stock Exchange is in advanced talks to buy the Chicago Stock Exchange, potentially scooping up the smaller venue after its sale to another buyer collapsed, according to people familiar with the matter. Story
Media sector: Bell Media has set the stage to acquire a majority stake in Pinewood Toronto Studios, which has been used to film Star Trek Discovery and The Expanse. Story
Mining sector: South Africa’s Gold Fields will buy a near 50 per cent share of Asanko Gold Inc’s Ghana subsidiary and take a stake in the Canadian miner in a US$202.6 million deal, it said on Thursday. Story
Exchanges: U.S. exchange operator CME Group has agreed to buy NEX Group for US$5.5-billion to create a cross-border powerhouse for investors trading in the multi-trillion dollar foreign exchange and government debt markets. Story
Canadian venture capital: Toronto-based Swift Medical has secured $11.6 million in funding led by Data Collective in Palo Alto, Californa. BetaKit
Bought deal: Stelco Holdings Inc. and Bedrock Industries B.V. have entered into an underwriting agreement with a syndicate co-led by BMO Capital Markets and Goldman Sachs Canada Inc. for a bought deal of 10,000,000 common shares of Stelco at a price of $21.75 per share for gross proceeds of $217,500,000 to Bedrock Industries B.V. Private Capital Journal
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Obituary: Peter Munk, a powerful man in a small frame, would claim he wasn’t afraid of death. It was frailty that terrified him; it meant that he could not play the game he had been playing all his life – building businesses, taking enormous risks, thundering like Lear when it all went wrong, then picking himself up, tilting his trademark Borsalino hat on his head and starting all over again, brimming with optimism. Story (Eric Reguly)
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