Over the past year the OSC has intensified its enforcement efforts and these efforts have produced much improved results. Major challenges remain especially with investigation and prosecution of emerging market listed companies. OSC staff proposed a number of policy initiatives to enhance it enforcement toolkit in OSC Staff Notice 15-704 (the “Staff Notice”). FAIR Canada has provided comments to the proposed enforcement initiatives…

Jonathan Chevreau of the Financial Post has written some recent articles questioning how sincere the mutual fund industry in Canada is in improving financial literacy given that Canada’s MERs are amongst the highest in the world. While knowledge of fees is improving, many investors are still unaware of the impact of high fees and are wrongly trusting mutual fund salespeople to act in their best interest…

Since our last newsletter on OBSI, FAIR Canada has written an open letter to Minister Flaherty, Canada’s Minister of Finance, in support of OBSI as the single external dispute resolution (EDR) provider for complaints arising from the banking sector. We pointed out that one single EDR provider is necessary in order to avoid fragmentation, inconsistencies, serious potential conflicts of interest, consumer confusion, and to enable the detection of systemic or widespread issues. As stated by OBSI’s Board…

FAIR Canada recently wrote an open letter to Minister Flaherty, Canada’s Minister of Finance, urging him to designate the Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments (OBSI) as the approved, sole provider of external dispute resolution (EDR) for financial client complaints and to make the recommendations of OBSI binding. A single dispute resolution service provider is necessary in order to avoid fragmentation, inconsistencies, serious potential conflicts of interest, consumer confusion, and to enable the detection of systemic or widespread issues…

FAIR Canada has submitted comments to the CSA opposing elements of the proposed implementation of Stage 2 of the point of sale initiative. FAIR Canada is disappointed and concerned that the CSA proposes to replace delivery of the simplified prospectus with delivery of the Fund Facts document, which we view …

FAIR Canada submitted a comment letter in response to consultation papers issued by securities regulators in BC, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec about the proposed acquisition of the TMX Group and CDS, and Alpha by a consortium of large banks and investment firms (Maple Group). FAIR Canada recommends that if regulators determine that it would be in the public interest to make the requested orders…

At the OSC Dialogue 2011, Howard Wetston spoke about the challenges and limits of regulating emerging market listings. Wetston spoke about the difficulties in enforcing Ontario’s Securities Act internationally and how representatives of stock exchanges, other regulators and industry could help address broader issues such as the role of auditors and underwriters, listing standards, as well as regulatory policy.

OSC Chair Howard Wetston speech “Regulating in the New Financial Reality” discusses the challenges facing the OSC. We are pleased to note that, speaking for the CSA, he endorses the existence of a single system of informal dispute resolution to which investors can have recourse as an alternative to litigation or binding arbitration.

FAIR Canada has provided comments to the CSA on its proposed national instrument for venture issuers. We support the objective of clarifying obligations for ventures issuers and increasing guidance so that compliance can be simplified and costs can be reduced. We also support efforts to improve disclosure so that it is more useful for investors…

FAIR Canada has written an open letter to the provincial Canadian securities regulators (CSA), calling for better investor protection from the risks associated with registrants who encourage retail investors to borrow funds to purchase mutual funds and similar products. The letter opens with the following request…