Securities Litigation

Our securities team specializes in the complex, high stakes field of securities regulatory defence and litigation. With extensive experience acting for companies, boards, directors, and shareholders in all facets of this field, we are able to provide strategic and legal advice that allows our clients to navigate difficult and stressful situations with confidence.

We have a proven track record as counsel for plaintiffs and defendants in all manner of securities litigation cases, ranging from securities class actions to common law and statutory misrepresentation claims to contested mergers and acquisitions.

We also regularly act for corporations, regulated professionals, and other individuals who are required to testify or respond to regulatory investigations and proceedings brought by securities commissions, the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization (formerly, the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada and the Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada), and the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario.

In addition, we conduct internal investigations on behalf of public issuers and advise on the best approach for disclosing potential breaches of securities and securities-adjacent laws to the appropriate regulator.

Our lawyers’ experience in litigating securities proceedings includes the following representative matters:

Representing corporate and individual clients in the context of claims alleging primary and secondary market breaches of the Securities Act (Ontario)

Representing companies seeking leave of the court to pursue contested plans of arrangement

Representing clients in investigations and proceedings under the Securities Act and before the Capital Markets Tribunal

Part of a team acting for the Receiver in a complex and significant receivership of an investment management firm, put into receivership pursuant to the Ontario Securities Act, which includes representing the receivership entity in ongoing proceedings before the Capital Markets Tribunal

Representing whistleblowers under the Ontario Securities Commission’s Whistleblower Program

Advising companies responding to takeover attempts and actions taken by activist shareholders where the issues have become litigious

Acting as external and in-house counsel for financial institutions defending against securities class actions arising out of alleged misrepresentations in the primary and secondary market

Representing financial institutions defending against class actions arising out of allegations of unlawful conspiracies to fix prices in the foreign exchange market and the gold market

R v. Beattie, 2017 ONSC 7686: Successfully defended a client charged with making a false prospectus under s. 400 of the Criminal Code

Goodwood Inc. v. Cathy Forest Products Corp., 2013 ONSC 4242: Successfully recovered shareholders’ costs incurred as a result of a s. 144 court-ordered shareholders’ meeting (Canada Business Corporations Act)

Dugal v. Manulife Financial Corporation, 2013 ONSC 4083, 2014 ONSC 1347: Defended former Manulife Chief Financial Officer in class action alleging Manulife’s risk management practices were inadequate

Falconbridge Limited, Re, 2006 ONSEC 21: Acted for Falconbridge, the subject of a hostile takeover

Katokakis v. William R. Waters Ltd., 2005 CanLII 4090 (ONCA): Acted for public company, Financial Models Company Inc., which was the subject of a takeover

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