FAIR Canada has provided comments to IIROC and the OSC regarding the regulation of dark liquidity. We support the policy rationale for the regulatory approach being undertaken by the CSA and IIROC in the Joint Notice and request for comments. We agree that the regulatory framework should allow the use of dark liquidity but should manage its impact on price discovery, fairness and overall market quality…

In response to the withdrawal of TD Bank from OBSI for banking disputes, the Advisory Council urged financial regulators to act quickly to reform OBSI’s governance, to designate OBSI as the single provider of consumer dispute resolution services in the banking and investment sectors, and to make its recommendations binding…

The federal government’s new Act which changes criminal code provisions relating to sentencing for fraud comes into force on November 1, 2011. The amendments create a 2 year mandatory minimum jail sentence for fraud over $1 million and add new aggravating factors which can be considered on sentencing in fraud cases which include…

FAIR Canada has submitted comments to the TSX in support of improved corporate governance practices of TSX listed issuers, and has also suggested additional amendments in the interests of shareholders. FAIR Canada fully supports the proposed changes which would require issuers listed on the TSX to elect directors individually, hold annual elections for all directors, disclose whether they have adopted a majority voting policy for directors for uncontested meetings…

FAIR Canada has provided comments to the Mutual Fund Dealers Association (MFDA) on amendments that propose to explicitly require firms and Approved Persons to ensure that the use of leverage is suitable for investors prior to recommending borrowing to invest.

W5’s recent program on CTV, Who is Protecting Your Investments, investigates a fraud allegedly perpetrated by Milowe Brost and Gary Sorenson (and others) which has been estimated to have cost 3,000 – 4,000 investors hundreds of millions of dollars. FAIR Canada reviewed this case in A Report on A Decade of Financial Scandals released in February 2011.

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FAIR Canada wrote an open letter to the Minister of Finance, Jim Flaherty, urging him to send the issue of the high cost of owning mutual funds for Canadians compared to Americans to the Senate National Finance Committee, to be included as part of its review of the price differential between U.S. and Canadian products generally.

FAIR Canada has recently written an open letter to the Canadian Minister of Finance, the Hon. Jim Flaherty, urging him to ask the Senate National Finance Committee to examine the high cost of owning mutual funds for Canadians in comparison to Americans. Minister Flaherty has asked the Committee to examine the price differential between Canadian and U.S. products.

FAIR Canada recently made a submission to the Canadian Securities Administrators in support of proposed cost disclosure and performance reporting requirements. Investors are in need of clear and complete information regarding the costs and performance of their investments in order to enable them to make informed decisions to meet their investment goals and objectives.